The Last Resort
by Quinn Mallory
Summary: When the Battle of Hogwarts goes very badly very fast, the Order is trapped in the Room of Requirement with no help coming. So they call in their last resort: the Muggles.
1. Chapter 1

Harry, Ron, and Hermione staggered off their brooms and into the hallway outside the Room of Requirement. Malfoy and Goyle fell from the brooms and crashed to the floor, semiconscious.

But there was no time for them to regroup. As they stood there, a mob of panicked students came racing into the corridor from the direction of the front of the castle, with Order members and teachers mixed in. Harry could see Lupin, one of his arms badly burned, nonetheless carrying Tonks, who was covered in blood but stirring feebly. Flitwick was levitating several younger students, unconscious or dead, who must have snuck back to join the fight. To Harry's relief, he saw Ginny in this mob, unhurt, and shouting angrily at some others, apparently trying to get them to regroup. Loud banging and blasts of spells could be heard behind them.

"There are too many!" Lupin shouted, seeing Harry. "We can't hold them!"

"We've found what we needed to find!" Harry bellowed back over the din. "We've got the Basilisk fang, we can destroy it – actually, that seems to be done already," he told Lupin as the group came up to the trio and Harry spotted the heap of ash.

"It must have been Fiendfyre," Hermione said, sounding frightened. "It is—"

"Damn it, not now!" Terry Boot snapped.

"Everyone inside!" Lupin called, opening the re-formed door to the Room of Requirement. "It will take them quite a while to get in here." He quickly helped Tonks inside and set her down gently against the wall.

"We've _lost_?" Harry demanded.

"Essentially, yes," Lupin answered, as people began streaming past him into the Room. "I…I don't know…" Harry had never seen him this overwhelmed, this beaten. "We could not hold our positions. Everything went wrong…someone would back up a bit to get a better angle, then someone else would think he was running, start running himself, and set off a stampede. There was friendly fire, the acromantulas, the…"

There was a series of loud bangs, followed by a crash as part of the ceiling fell in, and Kingsley came running around the corner and down the corridor. "Is everyone inside?" he asked, loudly but with his usual calm.

"Just about," Lupin answered, truthfully. "Of course, there are probably people cut off elsewhere in the castle. Did you see the Weasley twins?"

Right on cue, Fred and George came hurrying up the corridor the other way, along with several other students, one of whom was wounded and being levitated.

"We held the passage gallantly –"

"By which we mean no one actually tried to get through it—"

"Then we got your Patronus—"

"So here we are for the glorious last stand."

"Get inside!" Lupin shouted, as a curse flew past them. Death Eaters were coming up the corridor; Lupin and Kingsley shot Stunners into them and a couple toppled. Ron shoved Hermione into the Room, and seemed to be preparing to fight when Harry grabbed him and dragged him inside as well, followed by Fred and George's group. Lupin and Kingsley were the last in, several curses narrowly missing them as they slammed the door and locked it.

Everyone paused for a moment, literally and mentally catching his breath. Harry scanned the room, and estimated that two-thirds of the people who had been in the Great Hall were now here. He forced aside thoughts about the fates of the other third, turning to examine the door. The door, meeting the needs of its occupants, had become solid stone, with multiple bolts and bars, no doubt magically reinforced. Harry had never found a way to break into the Room of Requirement, he thought…but who knew what Voldemort could do?

"Right," Lupin said after a moment. "We need to decide what to do. I recommend we evacuate via the Hog's Head, then disperse again. They have no way to track us once we have Disapparated. Sooner or later they will find a way through that door, or else –"

The portal to the Hog's Head passage crashed open. Wands were trained on it instantly, but it was Aberforth, who whirled and slammed the door behind him.

"They must have heard the noise," he said bitterly. "The Death Eaters broke into the pub. We're trapped."

Someone screamed, and a hubbub of panic started to break out.

"QUIET," Kingsley Shacklebolt boomed.

Arthur Weasley forced his way through the mob to where Kingsley was.

"Kingsley, Lupin," he muttered, "Do you recall the discussion we had about a plan of mine? That we agreed would be a last resort?"

Harry looked at Hermione and Ron, confused, but neither of them displayed any glimmer of understanding. Before they could ask questions, Arthur continued.

"I think we have reached our last resort," he said quietly.

Kingsley and Lupin exchanged glances.

"What you propose is very dangerous," Lupin said.

"You know what You-Know, oh, yes, Voldemort, thinks of Muggles. It is no more dangerous to them than otherwise. Without the Ministry of Magic, we cannot protect the Prime Minister. And with the enemy controlling the government, Muggles will have no way to fight back."

"That is _not exactly_ the danger I was referring to," Lupin answered, but was cut off by Kingsley.

"Arthur is right," Kingsley said. "We are opening a can of worms, but at this point, I agree that we have no other viable options. The question is, how can we accomplish it? I will need to reach the PM's office, fight my way through any enemies there, and remove any Imperius Curse which he may be under."

" _Hominem revilio_ ," Hermione muttered, wand pointed at the secret passage. "There is no one within the passage yet," she announced. "Is it necessary to reach the Hog's Head to be able to Disapparate, or can it be done within the passage? Yes, I know one should not Apparate in distorted space, but in a case like this—"

"If Kingsley comes out with his head on upside down, he won't be any use," Ron put in. Arthur opened his mouth, probably to tell them to stay out of this, but Harry caught his eye and he closed it again.

"What we require is a way for Kingsley to reach the Hog's Head without being seen," Lupin summarized. "If he can take one step inside the Hog's Head, he can Disapparate."

Harry immediately thought of the Invisibility Cloak, but hesitated. It was a Hallow, it was his, it had been passed down from his father, and reluctance caught him for a moment—but only a moment, and he swiftly pulled it out, feeling ashamed.

"You can use this," he said, offering it to Kingsley.

"It is a good thought, but they will have spells in place—"

"This Invisibility Cloak is…special."

"Are you certain that this will work?" Kingsley asked, staring at Harry intensely.

"Do you have a better idea?" Ron broke in loudly.

"What do we do?!" someone in the crowd behind them shouted.

"We're gonna die!" screamed someone else.

"We will not die—not today, at any rate," Lupin snapped, turning to face the crowd. "We have a plan. Right now, we need to get organized." He began snapping out directions, ordering some to care for the wounded, others to try to reinforce the doors, and still others to send Patronus messages appraising people of the situation and asking for help. Hannah Abbot tried to ask him a question, but he put her off and hurried over to Tonks, taking her hand as he examined her wounds.

Kingsley took the Cloak. He put it on. His footfalls were inaudible in the general hubbub, but Harry watched as the passage door swung open, and then shut again. Hermione started towards a wounded Ravenclaw, then stopped and turned to Lupin.

"Would you please explain what you and Kingsley were talking about?"

"That would be nice, yes," Harry put in.

Lupin hesitated, and Arthur jumped in. "It occurred to me, after the Ministry fell, that the Muggles are in just as much danger as we are. Voldemort does not want them to exist, to take up space that could be used to give pureblood wizards massive estates."

"Also, if the Muggles are all murdered, no more Muggle-borns, solving another problem," Lupin added, walking back towards them.

"Right…so this is their fight, as well. With the weapons they have now, they'd have a decent chance against the Death Eaters. Kingsley is going to get the Prime Minister to call in the Muggle military."

"It violates the Statute of Secrecy, which is why we were so reluctant."

"As we discussed earlier, other countries' wizards are not coming to help us in any event," Arthur returned, "and if we lose, it will be a moot point—Voldemort will be able to do whatever he wants."

"Don't Muggles just have those metal wand things?" Ron asked. "You know, the, what is it, guns. A Shield Charm can stop those. What?"

Harry, Hermione, and Arthur looked at each other. "I'll explain," Hermione said. She started to tell him about tanks, and judging by the expression on Ron's face, this process was going to take a while.

Harry's mind was whirling. It had never occurred to him to try this. He had been so entranced by magic, all those years ago, that he hadn't questioned it. Thoughts triggered others, like masses of dominoes tumbling one after the other. Was it really reasonable for wizards to do nothing about Muggles' problems because wizards were "best left alone"? Of course Muggles would try to make petty and stupid demands on wizards' time, but…Healers could Apparate to respond to 999 calls, arriving in seconds instead of minutes. They could put up enchantments between those places in the Middle East, Israel and Gaza, stop rockets or missiles from going either way…and this was just the tip of the iceberg…

But Harry was suddenly jolted back to this reality by a series of loud bangs outside the door back into Hogwarts. The blasting got faster and louder, sounding like more than one wizard outside was doing it. The floor started to vibrate slightly, but there was no visible damage to the door.

"They're breaking in!" a Hufflepuff girl yelled behind them.

"It will take much more than that to break through," Lupin said confidently. As if on cue, the blasting stopped. Following a collective sigh of relief, Lupin spoke more quietly, and to Hermione, who was trying to explain to Ron how heat-seeking missiles worked. "Kindly help me strengthen the door."

Hermione got up and followed him over; they began muttering incantations. Ron looked at Harry, slightly stunned.

"Blimey, I had no idea," he said. "Did you know all this?"

"Oh, some of it. Back before I knew I was a wizard, you know, Muggle boys are, you know, they always think soldiers and tanks and…things…like that are cool. It's like with…with Chocolate Frogs."

"It's instinct," Hermione said, looking up from her work with Lupin. "The purpose of play is to practice skills needed for survival as an adult. So boys evolved to play with, and be interested in, things involving war."

"Evolved?" Ron asked.

"I'll explain later," Hermione answered, noticing Lupin looking at her. " _Protego horribilis…_ "

Harry got up and began to wander through the room. He watched as Hannah Abbot and Lupin tried to care for Tonks. Ginny was busy consoling a crying second-year, who had somehow been left behind. A Ravenclaw sixth-year shot Patronuses from her wand as quickly as she could, sending wisps of vapor speeding out of the room to various destinations; Lupin had said to get anyone willing to help grouped outside Hogsmeade, to try to retake the pub. Malfoy and Goyle didn't seem to be there, and Harry wondered, with more of a sense of curiosity than real concern, what had happened to them.

And with that thought, it gradually crept over him who _else_ he _wasn't_ seeing. Dean Thomas, Angelina Johnson…and Cho. Harry walked through the group again, scanning frantically, then abruptly stopped. He really didn't want to be sure; he didn't really want to know how many people were now dead because of him.

Kingsley Shacklebolt had to dodge several Death Eaters in the tunnel, but they seemed to be too confident in their spells. Once or twice he felt the shock as a spell attempted to reveal him, but the Cloak held. He was beginning to suspect why Dumbledore had had such an odd interest in this cloak.

He hurried whenever he dared, but progress was slow. The tunnel was crude hard stone, and the spells causing the Room to change things to the way one wanted them seemed to be ineffective here. As an Auror, he was trained to move quietly, but every footfall seemed to ring. Fortunately, the Death Eaters were lumbering around constantly, making loud echoes that drowned his steps.

Kingsley reached the painting. Two Death Eaters stood on the other side of the opened portal, leaving no space for anyone concealed to pass through. He considered quickly disabling them, but more were seated in the pub, three on a long bench at a table and four more in chairs at another. Several of these were drunk, but it was still too many. What he needed was a way to disable them both at once without the source being obvious. But soon, he remembered how Potter had dealt with the first task in the Triwizard Tournament.

" _Accio Bench_."

The bench lurched violently into the air, flinging the Death Eaters on it off in all directions. It soared towards the two Death Eaters at the painting, who were facing the tunnel and had only had time to turn when the bench smashed into them, sending them crashing to the ground. Kingsley leapt over the bench as it and the Death Eaters struck the ground, body shaking from the strain of Summoning something that large, took three quick steps into the pub proper, and Disapparated before anyone could work out what had happened.

The Right Honourable Tony Blair had become used to the voice in his head. It wasn't a _little_ voice, oh no; it shouted angrily at him when he did something wrong, so loud that he put his hands over his ears, which of course didn't help. For example, it had been wrong to try to investigate the Gaddley deaths further. It was _obviously_ a gas leak, even though no gas leaks had been found, because what else could kill people like that? He had tried to tell people about the voice once or twice, but when he did, it screamed at him so loudly he couldn't hear himself or anyone else, and his head hurt very badly. He had learned not to ask questions about this voice, so all he really knew was that it had started after a dream about a strange man in a black cloak and mask in his bedroom. It had to have been a dream, because he woke up much later.

The voice was quiet tonight, as though paying attention to something else. He was glad; for a while, it had been yelling complicated instructions almost every night about the investigation of Princess Diana's death and what to tell the media about it and God only knew what else, and (naturally) refusing to explain to him why it mattered so much. Now he could focus on his papers. This business with the tobacco advertising was giving him a headache.

 _Crack!_

A man in a long black cloak suddenly appeared in his office. The PM blinked.

" _Finite Incantatem!_ " the man shouted.

The voice was suddenly gone, and he was afraid. Just what had it made him do?!

"Right, Prime Minister. You may recall meeting with Rufus Scrimgeour last year?"

"Yes…" Blair answered, still failing to process the situation. "I was rather confused, since I had never been told about magic before."

It took a lot to shock Kingsley, but that did. " _What?_ Did they modify your memory?"

"No. Apparently Cornelius Fudge spoke to my predecessor, and was so in—that is, he neglected the results of the 1997 general election. No one came to tell me anything, but I managed to work it out from the context, you know. It wasn't too hard," he finished with the slight smile of a man clinging desperately to the edge of sanity with humor, "I'm not a Tory, after all."

"Right, well, that is not relevant now." Kingsley had regained his composure. "Prime Minister, you have been under the Imperius Curse for the past several months. This is a spell which compels its target to obey the commands of the caster." Blair nodded slowly. "You recall our discussion of," at the last second it occurred to him that Voldemort should _not_ know he was here, "a certain wizard who was posing a serious threat to our Ministry." Blair nodded more confidently. "He has since seized control of the Ministry of Magic," Kingsley went on. "Various groups of people opposed to him have gathered at Hogwarts Castle, which is a school for Britain's young wizards and witches. There is a battle taking place there now, which we are currently losing. I am here," Kingsley hesitated now, "to ask you for whatever assistance the armed forces can provide."

"Well, we will do what must be done. New Labour is willing to use military force—unlike many of my Labour predecessors—but only when justified—unlike most of my _other_ predecessors. However…there are some legal…concerns here. Are our adversaries Her Majesty's subjects?"

"Prime Minister, if a branch of your government were invaded by, say, the Irish Republican Army, would the UK military be used?"

"Yes, of course. And you said that, a, a school was being attacked? Are the students in it? Innocent children?"

"Some of them, Prime Minister."

"Well, innocent children are in danger…the decision seems clear, then." Blair started to rise, then hesitated. "But what do I tell our military? That is…this is not Iraq or North Korea. If I…of course, they aren't _insubordinate_ , naturally…but, rightly so…I cannot…if I order our Royal Air Force to bomb someone, they will have to be told something about who is being bombed and why. Do you…that is, I cannot, in effect, point at someone and say 'kill him' with no explanation, legally perhaps and certainly as a practical matter it will cause…difficulties."

Kingsley, meaning sinking in, stood frozen. This was a problem. They could try to invent a story…but why would terrorists, the IRA, or even foreign invaders have weapons that could do what wizards could do? If they lied about what the enemy could do, it would put the Muggle soldiers at a distinct disadvantage. But if they told them the truth…every last one would require Obliviation, and Kingsley knew how "secrecy" tended to go, if even one person told someone else, and that person told three others…

"What do I do?"

"Well," Kingsley said, with no idea what to say, but knowing something was required, "first of all, strictly speaking," his old desire for proper procedure came out, "you should be giving orders to me, not the other way about. Nominally, the Minister of Magic is simply another minister, and since the abandonment of the 'first among equals' policy, that means you have authority over him, and therefore me. And before you ask, he is under the Imperius Curse at the moment and—"

"Very well, _please advise me_ ," Blair broke in.

This was it. The future of the world was in the balance. But Kingsley knew the decision he had to make, as horrifying as it was. He had sworn to defend the Statute of Secrecy; but whatever happened, Voldemort could _not_ be allowed to win. Lying to the Muggle soldiers created too great a risk of that, and endangered them unnecessarily, to boot.

"Tell them the truth, Prime Minister," Kingsley said slowly and quietly.

"Very well," Blair answered. He hurried into the outer office, and began giving rapid instructions to his secretary to gather all of the other Ministers here as rapidly as possible starting with Defence, along with various Army and RAF brass. He then told her to prepare for a shock, before launching into an explanation of why and how there was a person in his office who had not come in through the door.

Kingsley, standing alone in the PM's office for a moment, felt the weight of history pivoting around him. He felt like a man who had just opened the sluice gates on a dam, sending water rushing through, going God knew where and sweeping everything away.


	2. Chapter 2

**Note: Much of the information about the details of COBR, and the UK's command-and-control procedures in general, is my own invention, as it is not available to the public. Also, none of the actions taken by real individuals state or imply anything about the actions the people involved would take in these situations or others; I don't claim to have realistically captured their characters.**

Things had settled down in the besieged Room of Requirement. The door and walls had been reinforced, visibly and otherwise. How exactly the windows were connected to the outside when the Room changed shape or size was one of those questions one tried to avoid thinking about, but in any case, they were now much smaller and had heavy bars. The walls looked less like those of a dormitory and more like those of a bank vault, and both doors had more locks and bars than Harry felt like counting, along with the silent crackle of magical forces holding them shut and intact. They had discussed collapsing (or whatever process happened when the Room shrank) the Hog's Head tunnel, but Hermione had pointed out that if any help was to come, it would have to come from there. But the Patronus efforts had not been a success so far; they had been promised some forty wizards and witches, but only 12 had, so far, gathered outside Hogsmeade; no one wanted to be the first to die. This was not even enough to retake the Hog's Head. After hours of trying to gather more, Lupin had told everyone to leave it be for a few hours and wait for more to come.

The wounded had all either been healed, or nothing more could be done for them. The defenses were strengthened to the limit. The little food available had been multiplied as much as was safe (repeated replication of food tended to make it toxic, for reasons not fully understood) and shared out. With little else to do, most of the people in the Room of Requirement were sleeping, or pretending to.

Three more attempts to break in had been made: blasting from the Hog's Head, what sounded like some kind of very destructive substance thrown against the door to the castle, and something that seemed to have involved Fiendfyre. The last one had started to chip away at the stone, but the Room changed itself in some subtle way and no further damage was done. The Marauder's Map showed anyone who cared to know that Thomas Riddle and about thirty of his people were on the other side of the Hogwarts door, with more in groups searching the castle. Several groups of defenders, mostly of older students, one including Professor Sprout and Professor Sinistra, were trapped in the castle but outside the room and had concealed themselves in various places in the building. Fred and George knew ways out that the Death Eaters weren't guarding, but no one could think of a way to get a message to these groups without giving away their positions. Fred and George had been tasked with monitoring the map, and trying to get a warning and escape route to them via Patronus if the twins saw Death Eaters approaching the groups' positions. The map didn't show the Hog's Head passage, but there was no reason to believe the Death Eaters weren't right on the other side.

Lupin, despite telling others to go to sleep, had resisted doing so himself, but was now snoozing by the door he was supposedly watching. Ron was asleep and snoring. Harry and Hermione were both still awake, neither able to sleep, and spoke quietly, watching the other door. They had concluded that it didn't look good. The Room could provide drinkable water, but no food, meaning that even if the Room did hold up indefinitely, they would not. Harry had started to joke about resorting to cannibalism before he realized that that might not be funny in a few days. And Voldemort still might find a way in at any time. He had (Harry did not tell anyone about this) attempted to seize control of Harry through their mental link and force him to open the door, but with the same results as this had had that night in the Ministry two years ago. Voldemort had also tried to project his voice in here, but Lupin and the Room had quickly put a stop to that. So Harry and Hermione sat there, leaning on each other, physically and mentally, as the stars slowly shifted outside the window. He checked his watch every now and then: 12:48, 1:03, 1:19…

In such situations, the PM, the ministers, and the relevant military commanders gathered in the Cabinet Office Briefing Room (COBR). This room had a medium-width rectangular conference table with rounded corners. Large displays provided current intelligence and information about the situation.

Kingsley and Blair hurried into the room at around 12:30 AM. There were ten or eleven people there, most of whom Kingsley did not recognize; Blair told him that they were most of the Defence Council, along with a few others. Blair quietly pointed out the Chief of the Air Staff, the Chief and Vice-Chief of the Defence Staff, along with the Chief Science Advisor, an ekeltric engineer called David Davies. Blair would have finished the introductions, but two more people hurried into the room and took seats, and he decided to get started and introduce them as he went along.

"Right," Blair said. "Mr. Shacklebolt, if you would proceed as we discussed?"

Kingsley stood. Leaving his other hand visible, he calmly levitated a coffee mug on the table into the air. Gasps were heard along the table, but not everyone was impressed; Davies, for example, looked annoyed, as though his time was being wasted by something he'd seen before.

He looked much less annoyed when Kingsley Vanished the mug. A wild confusion of shouting ensued at that, some wanting to know what had happened, others asking why they had been woken up to watch magic tricks.

"I will assure you," the PM declared, standing, "that what you all just observed was no trick. Mr. Shacklebolt is a wizard. There are other wizards in this country, more than a thousand of them, and witches as well. Please note that none of them are, to the best of our knowledge, associated with Satan or other malevolent supernatural entities which may or may not exist. Most of them are not evil. However, several of them apparently are, which is related to why we are all here right now."

A stunned silence fell, except for Davies, who got up rapidly. "But how does it _work_?!" he demanded. He looked like a man shaken to his core; most of the others seemed merely rattled.

"I do not know," Kingsley told him calmly. "None of us know."

"You mean you have…how long have there been wizards? How did this…is it hereditary? Is there a gene…can _animals_ do this?"

"In order," Kingsley answered, "we do not know but theories range from 500 AD to the beginning of humanity, it seems to be hereditary," ignoring some muttering about something called a Mendel, he continued, "and there are magical creatures, some of which are beings like us. And what is a 'gene'?"

" _Beings?_ Are you telling me that there are nonhuman sentient animals on this planet?!"

"Yes, Mr.…Davies, that is correct. There are goblins, centaurs, acromantulas…ah, house elves…"

"Mr. Davies," the PM broke in, as Davies was slack-jawed, along with much of the table, "as fascinating as all of this is, we have an immediate crisis to resolve."

Davies slowly shook himself. "Right…yes," he muttered weakly, and sat down with a thump.

"There are details which we will discuss later. Needless to say, none of this is to leave this room. You lot have all signed the Official Secrets Act and know what to do."

There were murmurs of acknowledgement.

"Right," the PM went on. The pauses normally punctuating his speech became shorter. "The situation, as Mr. Shacklebolt has explained it, is this. Hogwarts Castle is a castle somewhere in Scotland; exactly where it is cannot be determined because it is Unplottable, but Kingsley can lead people there. The building is used as a school for young wizards and witches. Earlier tonight, it was invaded by a sort of terrorist organization called the Death Eaters, which is led by a person with various names and identities," he had been warned by Kingsley not to use 'Voldemort', "but whose birth name is Thomas Riddle. He is an extremely powerful wizard and, based upon Kingsley's description of him and some consultations with a psychiatric expert, a sociopath, possibly with borderline personality disorder as well." Blair consulted his hastily scribbled notes. "Some other wizards and witches, including students and faculty of Hogwarts and members of a sort of paramilitary anti-Death-Eater organization called the Order of the Phoenix, resisted this invasion, but without success. The surviving defenders of the castle are currently trapped in a sort of…keep…for lack of a better…description. Mr. Thomas Riddle is outside and attempting to break in, which he will probably eventually do. Kingsley was sent here to request assistance from our armed forces to repel this invasion and restore lawful government."

"Restore lawful government?" the Minister of Defence asked.

"Oh, yes, I suppose I neglected to explain…there is a Ministry of Magic, and a Minister of Magic. The last person who was properly appointed to this post was a Mr. Rufus Scrimgeour, who was killed by the Death Eaters. Thomas Riddle then arranged for a person under his control to receive the post, a Mr. Pius Thicknesse. Therefore our…legal position…is that I will give an order, as I am…entitled, as Prime Minister, to do…that Mr. Thicknesse is relieved of his office and a successor will be appointed shortly. If the Death Eaters resist this order, as I expect them to do…military force will then be justified, to remove terrorists who have illegally occupied government property and…usurped the authority of Her Majesty's Government."

"Very well, sir," the Defence Minister answered.

"Now, Richard," Blair said, turning to the Chief of the Air Staff, "I want to look into an initial air strike against any Death Eaters and allies of theirs who may be…outside the building. There are no…friendlies…still outside the castle, but we do not want to damage the castle, because of friendlies and civilians inside, and the…functional, and historical, significance of the building to wizards."

Air Marshal Richard Johns scratched his chin, examining some papers, then replied. "Well, if it is Scotland, then we will want the RAF station at Lossiemouth. If I recall correctly, we have several squadrons of Tornadoes there, including the IDS type, which would be ideal for this purpose." He paused. "But, if the castle is…unplottable…then how will our pilots find the target?"

"I know where the castle is, so I can guide them to it, once told where…Lossiemouth is located," Kingsley stated.

"Guide them how?"

"I could take a broomstick. The new Firebolts can achieve one hundred and fifty miles per hour in level flight."

Johns frowned. "That is too slow."

"Too _slow_?"

"Jet engines operate inefficiently below approximately 200 miles per hour. The aircraft might have a problem with fuel shortages by the time the target is reached, especially if you cannot find it quickly. We could dispatch a tanker, but aerial refueling in darkness is very dangerous and I'd prefer to avoid endangering our pilots if we don't have to."

"Could you simply cram him into the cabin of the lead fighter?" someone in an Army uniform suggested.

"It's a crude solution, but it might work," Johns answered. "I will see if we have any aircraft in the area that can, that is, are designed to attain the appropriate speed and carry passengers, but if not…"

"There is another problem," Kingsley said. "Muggle equipment tends to fail in the vicinity of Hogwarts. I believe that there is 'too much magic in the air'. Simple things like, what is it, electric torches will work, even wizarding wirelesses, but Muggle stuff, increasingly, fails."

"Wait," Davies put in, looking like a man suddenly back in his depth. "You said that _simple_ electric circuits will work, but complicated ones fail? Do the complicated ones work again once they have been removed from the…Hogwarts area?"

"My understanding is that they do not," Kingsley answered, confused by the question.

"Of course!" Davies almost shouted. "It makes sense, a very weird kind of sense, but sense. Magic operates by manipulating electric and magnetic fields! That's how you lifted that mug off the table, I've seen similar things with electrically induced magnetism, although how you made it vanish I don't pretend to understand." Seeing his listeners' noncomprehension of the fundamental principle he was getting at, he elaborated. "Rapid changes in electric and magnetic flux induce electric currents inside complex circuits, particularly integrated circuits, which overload the components and destroy them. You may have heard of the idea of an electromagnetic pulse—an EMP? That, is what magic does."

"And our equipment," Richard Johns said, "is protected from EMP. Our aircraft are designed to continue operating in the event of global thermonuclear war. I would say there is a good chance they can survive the effects of the castle. We can send one aircraft ahead to try it, and if all goes well, the rest'll go in. How are we going to get visuals on the targets?"

"Saturation could work," someone suggested. "Just spray enough rounds in the general direction—"

"But what about Shield Charms?" Kingsley broke in. "Can you penetrate them?"

"Shield what?"

"Of course, you would not know. And there is no way to test it which does not put myself, or some other wizard, in considerable danger."

"Are they known to—is it known to be possible for these…charms to be overwhelmed by impacts?" Davies asked.

"One moment," Kingsley said, rapidly thinking through all of the reports he remembered seeing back at the Ministry. "Yes, I recall an incident in which two Aurors were trying to Apprehend a 'Mugger'—that is what we called a wizard who uses magic to steal from Muggles—and the 'Mugger' used a Reductor Curse to trigger an avalanche. A boulder struck one of the Aurors and broke his Shield Charm, but fortunately his partner grabbed him and Disapparated before he was crushed by the falling debris."

"I didn't follow most of that, but you say a boulder was able to break the…shield?"

"Yes. Of course, he was not prepared for it."

"And that makes a difference?"

"Look, this is no use," the PM declared. "Shacklebolt doesn't have any idea what our weapons can do and doesn't understand our units, and…vice versa. What do we have to lose by trying it?"

"We could lose our planes and pilots," said the Air Chief. "But given what Kingsley said about technology around these people, they are unlikely to be able to hit the airplanes. Targeting and tracking will be visual, at night, against aircraft which are designed to avoid low-level antiaircraft fire."

"Very well," the PM said. He called the building's operator and told him to contact Lossiemouth.

Contact was quickly made with Lossiemouth. It was possible with the new systems (it was amazing what could be done with these new networked computers, the PM thought) to quickly dispatch pictures of the base to the screens in the COBR. While Kingsley studied the pictures, he and the Air Marshals rapidly issued explanations and orders to the No. 617 RAF Squadron, asking Kingsley clarifying questions now and again. With the pictures studied and the orders issued, Kingsley was able to Apparate, first to Birmingham, then into the command center at Lossiemouth. The others began to discuss deployment of the SAS to Hogwarts and the Ministry of Magic, and orders began to be dispatched.

Overwhelmed by the strange sights and sounds around him, Kingsley was rapidly escorted by two RAF ground men to a waiting airplane, apparently called a Panavia Tornado, and bodily hoisted into the seat next to the pilot. They were both sort of crammed in, Kingsley had an oxygen mask jammed over his face, and the canopy was swung shut, cramping them even more. The pilot grinned at him, but still seemed somewhat annoyed about the cramping, as the plane's engines fired up and it started to move towards a long black strip of pavement. More planes, apparently the rest of the 617 Squadron, could be seen behind and ahead of them. Kingsley watched, stunned, as a sudden roar came from the lead airplane, which streaked faster and faster down what he was told was a "runway". He could see some sort of fire and smoke rising from the back of it as the wheels left the "runway"; the plane pitched upward, rose, and vanished into the night. More airplanes began to do this on other "runways".

"Merlin's pants," Kingsley muttered, surprising himself for cursing like that. Then he realized he would be shortly doing the same thing. "Merlin's pants!"

"Here we go, Mr., uh, Shacklebolt," the pilot told him as the last plane ahead of them took off. Chatter could be heard over the radio, and Kingsley vaguely gathered that the other planes were waiting for them to all take off. The plane rolled quickly toward the start of the "runway", turning slowly to face down the dual long chains of lights marking the strip. The pilot thrust some levers forward, and with a roar behind them that rattled Kingsley's body, a force gripped Kingsley and thrust him against the seat and the pilot. The plane accelerated down the strip; the lights went by, flashing, then flickering, then no longer visibly changing at all, and then the whining sound of the wheels on the pavement vanished along with the lights and a sort of whooshing roar was all around them.

"Right," the pilot asked of him, performing some operation which involved tipping the plane slightly so it would turn, "I need a heading."

Kingsley got his stomach and fear under control firmly; he was an _Auror_. It was no good talking about _cardinal directions_ when trying to reach Unplottable places; one had to go on instinctive mental maps, which made this sort of thing very difficult.

"That way," he said, pointing. The pilot looked suspicious, but began turning the plane back that way, speaking into the radio.

Harry lay there quietly, kind of appreciative of Hermione's warmth. The room was getting colder as the night went on, even with the stone. Maybe it was the protective enchantments. Of course, he could light a magical fire or something, but he was a little nervous about that right now. Given how their luck had been going, he would probably start a Fiendfyre and kill them all.

He and Hermione had laid out blankets by the pub door. The idea was that a Death Eater seeing Harry would hesitate or at least use a non-lethal spell, due to Voldemort's standing order to "leave him for me," giving everyone else a split-second advantage. Hermione had refused to let Harry take this position alone, so here she was. Ron was asleep somewhere else, and they had decided not to try to wake him.

Someone coughed. Harry shifted out of his stupor and glanced at his watch: 1:28 AM. Maybe Voldemort had decided to wait them out. Harry then became aware of a strange noise in the distance.

For a moment he thought it was the Death Eaters trying to break in again, but it was…it was an _airplane!_ But airplanes never came near Hogwarts. Unless…

Harry leapt up, causing a snoozing Hermione to fall to the floor and wake with a yelp. He dashed to the barred window and looked out. The sound was getting louder, but nothing could be seen except some acromantulas in front of the castle, giants by one side, and Death Eaters milling around by a fire in between them (probably to keep them from attacking each other). The planes became louder still…


	3. Chapter 3

The IDS-type Panavia Tornado is equipped with a Mauser BK-27 machine gun. This weapon fires slugs with a mass of 0.26 kilograms, at 1100 meters per second; the rate of fire can be set at either 1000 or 1700 rounds per minute. Hence, the muzzle energy is 315.8 kJ in each slug, sending almost _ten_ _megawatts_ of kinetic power against the target. By comparison, a typical Wal-Mart store draws an average of about one megawatt of electrical energy. The airplane has automated terrain following, allowing the pilot to focus on the strafing run, and preventing the airplane from crashing before the pilot can react.

Of course, neither Harry nor Kingsley knew any of this. But neither did their adversaries.

Kingsley, up in the planes, watched as the pilot in his plane flicked a switch. Images of the grounds below began to flicker across a screen, but with most objects looking like ghosts in a dark night—except for some large bright spots in one group, and a greater number of smaller, fainter bright spots in another group. Radio messages were being exchanged constantly, and the squadron leader seemed to be having some difficulties conveying the proper information. It did not help that not everyone had seen the pictures transmitted to the RAF station, so some of the pilots were trying to rapidly get information from others about that. Kingsley wondered whether they were always this disorganized, but quickly realized it was due to the _ad hoc_ nature of this operation.

"What is that?" Kingsley shouted over the noise of the engine and radio, pointing at the screen.

"Infrared imager!" the pilot (whose name he still did not know) shouted back. "That's the human and…giant hostiles, all right. The big spiders don't show up well. Don't talk now, I must focus." Kingsley glanced behind him and was actually startled to notice another person behind them, equipped with several large screens and another joystick, which didn't seem to be being used at the moment. That man was also completely focused on whatever he was doing.

The planes wheeled around over the grounds. In the darkness, Kingsley could only see two other airplanes, but they were turning as well, in perfect time with the one he was in. The acceleration was violent, and he began to feel ill again. This became worse when the pilot tipped the airplane forward, sending it plunging rapidly toward the ground, then pulling up at the last moment. Ahead of him, a strange noise began—

Harry, of course, didn't know this, but the Mauser fired so rapidly that the explosions were not distinguishable. With a Seeker's eye, he had seen black shadows speed past overhead, filling the grounds with a roar. Startled, the acromantulas reared, but any noise they might be making was suddenly drowned by a sound between a motorbike engine and a jackhammer, the continuous roaring blast of the machine guns. The light of curses being fired flashed through the grounds, but Harry saw no sign of any planes having been hit. In the flickering light, though, he saw that many of the Death Eaters had fallen, shapes distorted and unpleasant. The blasting stopped for a moment, allowing confused shouting to briefly gain mastery of the audible range: everyone behind Harry in the Room seemed to be yelling at once; the Death Eaters were shouting orders, casting curses, and screaming in rage or pain; and the giants released savage, blood-chilling roars that echoed against the forest and castle and forest again. Hermione nudged Harry aside so she could see through the window, closely followed by a suddenly roused Lupin, then…

Another two planes screamed low. The blasting began again. It was all so fast, only a few seconds had passed since the planes were still off in the distance. In the darkness, no one could really see the damage as bullets struck the giants, but they certainly saw the effects. Harry had counted seven giants standing outside the castle before the planes came. In an instant, four of them were falling like toppled redwoods. The planes rose away from the ground again; immense crashes arrived tardily as the dead or dying giants smote the ground, shaking the entire castle, sending many of the defenders, struggling to rise, falling into and over one another. Harry clapped his hands over his ears against the incredible noise, and nearly fell over backward himself; Hermione seized his cloak and yanked him back upright. Lupin clutched the bars of the other window, holding on firmly, as the shocks swept on.

Among the many things the acromantulas could do well was see in the dark. They saw the effects of the planes' attacks, and it was only the sheer volume of their leader's terrified hiss that let Harry's ringing ears hear it. The massive spiders scattered in a black tangle of limbs toward the forest, running faster than Harry had ever seen them go, not looking back. Curses continued to fly from the group of Death Eaters in the grounds, but Harry saw no sign that any of them had hit the planes.

One of the remaining three giants promptly booked it for the forest as well. The other two released fresh massive, bellowing roars and charged at full speed towards Hogwarts Castle. But two more planes could just be heard over this noise, tearing downwards to attack. Neither giant reached the castle.

Above all this, Kingsley gripped anything he could grip, as his airplane began its run. The pilot had to radio the man behind him to do…something, that Kingsley was blocking him from doing. The infrared scanner showed the Death Eaters setting up some sort of formation on the ground, trying to get space between themselves, but they couldn't do it fast enough—

Kingsley's stomach seemed to flip as the airplane went into near free fall for a moment or two, then levelled off a frighteningly low place. Though he couldn't see it, the man behind him pressed a button, sending this incredible rattling blast resounding through the airplane. The Death Eaters replied with a (partly) cohesive volley that was a moment too slow, flying far behind the airplane, as it started to rise again. It was hard to tell what had happened on the ground; it took a while for dead bodies to get cool enough for their IR emission to drop, and of course the wounded never would.

The squadron leader frowned as he listened to the hasty reports coming in after each pass, as did the PM and members of the Defence Council watching and listening from COBR. There was no good way to determine damage, was the trouble.

"Sirs," he said respectfully, punching up the correct line, "I am requesting permission to use a Paveway unguided bomb, sirs. I believe that that will neutralize the remaining hostiles outside the castle, unless they disperse further, sirs."

Blair hesitated. "Contact Mr. Shacklebolt," he said after a moment. "Ask him."

The request was quickly relayed to Kingsley. He was aghast. "Tell them," he said, "that that is a very bad idea. The castle could be damaged, and if parts of the castle collapse it could injure or kill our allies inside. Besides…it is rather…indiscriminate. This is still a law enforcement matter; that is, they should be taken alive, when possible." He realized this was somewhat belied by the use of machine guns, but there were right and wrong ways to do things, nonetheless.

The pilot quickly relayed this to the squadron leader and COBR. A long pause followed over the radio, as the jets wheeled around the castle. Curses flew here and there, but the airplanes could barely be seen at this distance, let alone hit.

"I am afraid not," the PM said finally. "As I understand very little of this, I will do as Kingsley advises. I agree that the risk is too great, and I do not see the benefit."

"Should we pursue and destroy the remaining _monsters_ , sir?" the squadron leader asked. Kingsley heard this, and would have quickly stood in another situation. As it was, he seized his pilot's shoulder. "Tell them," he said at once, "that those creatures are rare, valuable, do not appear to pose any further threat, and just as, I believe the word used was, _sentient_ as you or I."

"Ah, sir—"

"We heard you, Mr. Shacklebolt," Blair said with a slight smile. "Squadron leader—what is your name, by the way?"

"Sir, Squadron Leader James Dursley, sir."

Kingsley raised his eyebrows. That seemed a rather improbable coincidence, especially if they were in fact related. Perhaps it was some effect of Lily's protection? No, impossible, that broke months ago…

Blair, meanwhile, could be heard engaged in a hasty discussion with the RAF brass. Furious but incomprehensible muttering could be heard over the radio. Blair spoke again after a few moments.

"Mr. Shacklebolt. Are you certain that the…acromantulas…will not return?"

"It does not matter if they do! We _cannot_ forego such a fascinating opportunity—their exoskeletons shouldn't be able to support them, for crying out loud! I need living—"

"Mr. Davies!"

"Prime Minister." Kingsley answered, "If I understand this 'night vision' screen correctly, the acromantulas are moving as quickly as they can away from the battle. I doubt that they will return; they have no particular loyalty to Voldemort, and cannot be Imperiused. No doubt they were promised a reward in…well, let us just say that I do not think they will return."

Tony Blair spoke again. "Squadron leader—" He was interrupted by noise on the other end for a moment. "Air Marshal, your concerns are noted, but I have made a decision. Squadron leader, take your aircraft and return to your base. You will remain on alert, and be ready to take off again promptly; those orders will also be transmitted to the base."

"Sir, very good, sir!" Sqd Ldr Dursley answered. He felt a strong impulse to take one hand from the controls to salute, but his pilot's instincts prevented this until he realized a moment later how foolish that would be. He then began, as crisply and precisely as he could (the _prime minister_ and _Chief of the Air Staff_ were listening!) to issue the orders to leave the holding pattern and return to Lossiemouth.

While all this was going on, Harry and Hermione were trying to avoid being knocked down and trampled by the people pushing toward the windows from behind them, i.e., almost everyone else in the Room. A moment later, the windows expanded, still with the bars in place, allowing people to spread out for a better view. Railings grew around Harry and Hermione, holding the crowd back, and allowing them to move away from the windows.

"I can hardly blame them," Hermione noted, noticing that George was now on the ground with a boot print on his back, swearing loudly, "but I really wish that people would _think_ sometimes." She flicked her wand, hoisting him to his feet.

"Why, many thanks, my fair lady, and none for the rest of those gits," he said cheerfully. "Sweet?" He pulled some bright green thing from one of his pockets. Hermione and Harry rapidly shook their heads. "Now. What's all of the fuss about?"

"Muggles in airplanes are attacking the Death Eaters," Hermione informed him. He immediately turned around and raced toward the windows, nearly knocking someone over himself. Harry chuckled.

Lupin forced his way back through the crowds. By this time, the planes were flying away, leading to disappointed groans from those who had not seen what had happened. A hubbub of talk broke out, as those who had seen the strikes explained the situation to those who had not.

"Harry," Lupin said very seriously, "I have to ask you to do something. Open your mind to Voldemort. We need to know what he is thinking."

The need to open anything vanished a moment later, when blinding rage hit Harry like the burning-hot treasure (was that only this morning? It seemed like weeks), blasting through his defenses and bringing him into Voldemort's mind and body, pale white fists clenched, air hissing through slits of nostrils

" _You are lying_!" Harry screamed, insane with fury, yet knowing the man was _not_ lying, and the fear trickling from that thought kept him from killing the worm in front of him—he, Lord Voldemort, might yet need him. "Muggles _cannot do this_! _How could this happen_?!" Harry's nearly-stifled psyche noticed that he could hear the voice in two different ways; it was so loud as to filter through into the Room. Harry and Voldemort's arm swung again, " _Reducto_!" the curse smashed into the door, stone flying, bars bending—

By an immense effort of will, Harry separated Voldemort's mind from his own. He did not need the link to hear Voldemort's voice, a wild blending of rage and triumph, and shouting: " _With me! Now!_ " Lupin and one or two others began screaming orders at the bulk of scared and confused witches and wizards by the windows, trying to spread them into an arc around the door. At least a few of them could pull off effective _Avada'_ s, and if Voldemort was foolish enough to charge in first…

A tremendous blast struck the door all at once. The stone crumbled, then suddenly shattered, chips and chunks flying, a great cloud of dust all that was between them—

But before anyone could do anything, the stone was replaced with clean, shining metal that ringed the Room of Requirement. Anyone watching the ceiling would have seen it appear across there an instant later, then some kind of glass replacing the bars over the windows. The doors were now very odd constructions; each was a kind of very oblong dome made of a single layer of more of the strange glass, then more metal, swinging from its narrow end by sleek, modern hinges. Voldemort blasted the new door several more times and did not put a dent in it.

"What the ruddy _hell_?!" Ron, who had just now finally woken up, demanded.

"It's the airplanes!" Hermione shouted, sounding like that little precocious smartass from all those years ago. "The Room must have, in some fashion, observed the material comprising the airplanes and replicated it to support the walls! Combined with magic as the stone was, the strength will be superb."

"Blimey, I had no idea it could do that," Harry said gingerly, massaging the violent pounding headache he now had.

"Until a few moments ago, it could not," Hermione explained, her excited voice hurting Harry's head. "It… _adapted_ , like a living thing…"

"Perhaps in a way it is," Lupin said. "Or perhaps it used our minds, drawing the idea from us as a…"

"Collective consciousness?" Hermione suggested.

"Yes, something like that."

Voldemort was now screaming and blasting wildly at the door and walls, without any noticeable effect. If the aircraft metal—Harry had no idea what it was, come to think of it, probably some kind of alloy composite or whatever those were called—was as thick as the stone had been, it would be very strong.

Back in England, COBR had been busy. A squadron of Britain's finest soldiers, the SAS, were rapidly boarding helicopters. There was officially a squadron in Scotland already, but they were unofficially in Eastern Europe at that moment, trying to do various things to which the UK government firmly denied any connection. And as many military commanders have found, soldiers who only exist officially are not really any use at all. Two more squadrons of SAS, along with various other British Army units, were moving themselves and their equipment into personnel carriers, preparing to head for London. The Metropolitan Police were issued orders to establish a cordon around a certain area of London, which included a vandalized telephone booth with some very unusual connections and a public toilet with equally unusual traffic patterns, and to clear civilians out of there, with a story about a major gas leak. Large mugs of black tea (they were not yet ready to resort to coffee, which the Science Adviser described as "American liquid cocaine") were brought into COBR, the main command and control room at Lossiemouth, and various other offices throughout Britain. This would be a long night.


	4. Chapter 4

**Note: Due to my total lack of a military background, I have no doubt inadvertently written things in this story, and will continue to do so, which would cause loud guffaws from actual SAS members. For that, to them and to my readers, I apologize.**

As soon as Kingsley was both back on the ground and able to stand again, he shot a Patronus to Lupin in the Room, asking about their status. Having done that, he allowed two airmen to lead him back to the command center. The PM asked him to return to COBR at once. Kingsley Apparated to an empty field in the Midlands before Apparating there. He had no desire to Splinch himself.

He appeared in COBR with a loud crack. Most of the room jumped, startled, and the Science Advisor yelped. One of the generals had to go to the door and assure the guards outside that there was not an assassin in there shooting people.

"Ah, I am glad to see you are here," the PM said to Kingsley, smiling politely. "Sit down…I have been discussing a ground assault on the…castle with these gentlemen from the Army. Lossiemouth has informed us that…all of their navigation instruments malfunctioned on the way to…the castle."

"It's very interesting," the Science Adviser put in. "It's almost as though the Uncertainty Principle is somehow applied at a macro scale, preventing us from determining the position to more than a certain degree of accuracy. Of course, that doesn't explain the mechanism, since the way the Principle operates…" He noticed the rest of the room looking at him and stopped talking.

"The point is that…the pilots _may_ be able to reach the target again…intuitively, but it would be wiser for you to guide them back again." Blair gestured to a man in a uniform with a great many shiny things on it.

"Our overall plan at the moment is as follows," he stated, putting Kingsley in mind of a large dog barking. "It is currently 0144 hours. It will take several hours to bring SAS units there, so we may as well wait until daylight. Night vision in darkness would afford a tactical advantage, but given the—combat environment, I don't trust it." He stopped for a moment, apparently having trouble processing all of tonight's revelations. The PM cleared his throat, and the general continued. "The immediate question is whether our objective is merely the defense of the castle, or whether we are attempting to contain the enemy and kill or capture all of them. We have Army units closer to the area, and may be able to establish a perimeter."

"We wanted your views on this, Mr. Shacklebolt."

"If you can trap Voldemort and the Death Eaters, please do it."

"Very well," the general continued. "I need some idea of the surrounding terrain. Our pilots reported extensive grounds, several structures outside the castle, and a large area of dense vegetation."

"Oh," Kingsley said. This would not be easy to explain. "You need not worry about any of that. You…no one can get out any way but through the main gate area. There is a sort of…loop." Everyone looked confused, so he elaborated. "Anyone walking away from the castle, in a straight line, in any direction except towards the gates would eventually end up back where he started."

"The material question is," the general growled, after a few moments of trying to process that, "is it sufficient to secure the gate area to prevent anyone from leaving the castle grounds?"

"Yes."

"Very well. Issue the orders," he said to someone with somewhat less metal on his uniform.

"Yes, sir." The less reflective person picked up a telephone, pushed several buttons, and began speaking.

"The sun will rise at approximately 0530 hours. The SAS currently on route to the combat zone are the A Squadron of the 22nd SAS Regiment—the finest soldiers we have. There are 67 men in this squadron, divided into four troops, each with 17 men, except Mountain Troop. We were discussing the details when you arrived. I believe that the best plan is for the Air Troop to HALO jump into the area near the sports arena, while the other three troops enter through the main gate. Air Troop will then clear that area and advance towards the castle. The Boat Troop will sweep clockwise, clearing the area around the lake of any hostiles. Mobility Troop will sweep counterclockwise, clearing the rest of the grounds near the castle. And Mountain Troop will advance toward the castle and attempt to gather information. Once the grounds are secure, all four troops will converge on the castle, and attempt to enter. B Squadron will provide reinforcements where needed."

"What about Hogsmeade?" Kingsley asked. His Auror's mind was mostly able to follow that.

"What is that?"

Kingsley's explanation was interrupted by the arrival of a silver, glowing wolf through the air vent.

"Be quiet," Kingsley said firmly as it began to speak.

" _Voldemort has attempted to break through the door repeatedly, but it has resisted him, more recently in a rather unusual fashion. The Marauder's Map shows that all of the Death Eaters who were outside, are now in here with the rest of them, or no longer a problem. We saw the…attack, it appears to have been…very effective. Harry thinks Voldemort is refusing to leave because of him. We are in no immediate danger. Please try not to damage the castle if you can avoid it, but getting these people out of here should be the priority."_

"That was a Patronus message from Remus Lupin, a member of the Order who is currently inside Hogwarts," Kingsley explained to the room full of unhinged jaws. The PM nodded. Slowly.

What followed was considerable complicated and tedious discussion. Finally, they concluded that the best plan was to approach from both directions. While A Squadron assaulted the castle as discussed earlier, B Squadron's Air Troop would parachute into one end of Hogsmeade, while the other three troops advanced from the other. They would converge on the Hog's Head, clear it, contact the wizard reinforcements in Hogsmeade, and go through the tunnel along with the wizards. Anyone wishing to evacuate could then do so. The two squadrons would then coordinate to trap the remaining Death Eaters between them and engage simultaneously. They had wanted air support, but Kingsley talked them out of it; in daylight, compared to a man on a broomstick firing Reductor Curses, airplanes and attack helicopters were very large targets. A man with a round face and rather large nose, who was apparently the Defence Secretary, agreed to all of this.

While all this was going on, trouble was imminent in Hogwarts. A group of four students was about to be cornered by Death Eaters on the fourth floor. Fred, George, Harry, Hermione, and Lupin had gathered around the Map, watching the situation. The students were three Hufflepuffs, plus Seamus Finnegan. Harry watched as their names sped down a corridor, Death Eaters in hot pursuit.

"Are there any secret passages in that area?" Hermione demanded.

"No," either Fred or George answered. "There's the Hagar the Hungry tapestry, but those Death Eaters are between them and it."

Trapped, the four sort of churned around for a moment, then hurried into a classroom.

"Professor Lupin, could you lift the anti-Apparition spells?" Hermione asked desperately. The four students seemed to be trying to seal the door behind them, piling the desks against it (that was the obvious interpretation of them taking repeated trips quickly away from the door and more slowly back, going further each time) and (hopefully) reinforcing the whole business with magic.

"Not even Dumbledore could have done that," Lupin told her. "He could suspend them for a little while in limited areas, but he had to be there to do it. The spells are part of the castle. I could never do it." His tone became angry. "Fred, George, why didn't you see this and warn them?"

"We weren't sure they had been seen, and didn't want to give them away if they hadn't been," George said, turning his head enough to be identified. "By the time we knew they'd been seen, it was too late."

The Death Eaters had formed a tight group outside the classroom door. They could probably have broken in already, but with their victims trapped, they could take their time. Also, probably no one wanted to be the first one in.

"Lupin," Hermione breathed suddenly, "could you remove the anti-Apparition spells within a very small volume? Say, a half-meter cube?"

"That small an area…it is _just_ possible, if I had cooperation, but what good—"

Hermione looked slightly ill to be considering this, but pressed on. "If they attempt to Apparate, with Apparition only possible in the space occupied by part of their bodies…they will Splinch. There is a high probability that the Splinched parts will remain connected…internally. They could all do this from the wall of that classroom into the next one." She now looked more than slightly ill. "Someone…would have to stay behind…to hide the—body parts. There are any number of ways to do that. Then…when this is all over, we come and, well, put them back together."

"This sounds _a bit_ dangerous," Harry put in. "Are the Death Eaters going to kill them, or would they be willing to take them alive? I mean, should we risk something like that?"

"I wish we could hear what they were saying!" Fred exclaimed.

"Yes, well, we never found a way to do that—what?" Lupin demanded, looking at Fred and George, who were looking at him with their mouths open.

" _Mooney_ …" Fred said, in exactly the way you'd expect for a man who had just realized he'd been missing the obvious for years.

"Harry never—well, no time for that now," Lupin said, looking at Harry oddly.

"Why don't they just blast a hole into the next classroom?" Harry asked (he was not sure what Lupin had wanted him to tell Fred and George, and there'd never been a good time to ask).

"The walls of Hogwarts are magically reinforced," Hermione answered. "Really powerful wizards can do limited damage, but they couldn't. It's in _Hog_ —"

"Not now!"

"I don't think it will work, Hermione," Lupin said. "It'll take too long, and I'd be very surprised if they could keep their nerve. Not everyone can be in Gryffindor. _Keep their nerve_ …that gives me an idea."

He stood fluidly, then began speaking, preparing a Patronus message. He was speaking unusually loudly, making him quite audible to the people around him, causing them to smile broadly as they got the idea.

A few moments later, a silver wolf charged down a corridor, ignoring curses shot at it by the black-robed and masked men in front of a classroom door. It passed through said door, and began to speak very loudly in Remus Lupin's voice.

"We have the reinforcements from Hogsmeade," the voice said. "There are thirty or forty of them. They are coming through the secret passage down the corridor. If the Death Eaters try to break in, try to kill the first one in, if you can do nothing else. This might well come down to attrition. Otherwise, _stay put_ until they come; they will be here momentarily."

A few moments after _that_ , the Marauder's Map showed a group of Death Eaters moving rapidly away from the classroom. Lupin began to send another Patronus, speaking much more quietly this time, setting straight the group in the classroom and giving them directions to a nearby and unguarded secret passage out of the building.

Captain Macduff, 22 SAS Regiment, A Squadron, Air Troop commander, frowned at his crudely sketched map. Because of the need for haste, they were trying to get people briefed via the radios in the helicopters. Anyone who had played that game in which one person tried to describe a picture to another could tell you why this was a bad idea. He was also concerned about the _magic_. It wasn't about _fear_ , of course—he just wasn't completely certain his superiors hadn't gone mad.

As he stopped focusing on the "map", the constant roar of the AW159 Wildcat's rotors seemed to return to full volume. He, most of Air Troop, and a few guys from the Mountain Troop had been put into this helicopter (a civilian might describe them as crammed in, but Captain Macduff hardly noticed). The rest of Air Troop, according to Major Norwood, were on another helicopter just behind them. This was another problem, since they would have to confirm consistent understanding of given information once they arrived. The orders back at base had been to load as fast as possible regardless of, essentially, anything else, so things had been rather disorderly. Based on the travel time to even the very top of Scotland, and their orders not to go in until 0535, this seemed to be a clear case of "hurry up and wait". Maybe they wanted them there to prevent a breakout attempt.

The men, as he'd expected, were quiet, speaking only to ask necessary clarifying questions. Talkative, jovial types didn't usually last long in the SAS selections. Nonetheless, a few of them were clearly worried. Lance Corporal Smith was assembling and disassembling his L119A1 (in, to Captain Macduff's annoyance, a whole 50 seconds each way—what were they teaching this lot these days?). Corporal Jones seemed to be praying, despite the fact that Macduff had seen Richard Dawkins' books in his personal possessions. Macduff needed to make sure his men were emotionally combat-ready, but given the unusual situation, was unsure what to say. Then he knew—like the best combat plans, _simple_.

" _Who dares wins_ ," he declared firmly.

" _Who dares wins_ ," his men echoed, nodding. Smith finished fitting his assault rifle together, firmly, and refrained from stripping it again. Jones muttered a quick _amen_.

Macduff returned to giving the radio operator questions to relay. He realized he was irritating him, and probably whoever was answering these questions, but he wasn't going to let his men get killed because of some stupid misunderstanding caused by a question which he'd thought was too thick to ask.

While helicopters roared north, armored personnel carriers were racing in line through the streetlight-lit, largely empty streets of London. Drivers looked at them, confused and curious. Inside, the D and G Squadrons of the 22 SAS Regiment sat.

Each soldier was equipped with the new standard (for special forces) L119A1 carbine, to half of which were attached grenade launchers. Ordinarily, sniper rifles and light machine guns would have been included, but this fighting would be in a confined space against foes with Shield Charms, and on Kingsley's advice, they were not. There had been some on-principle resistance to this from the generals, but the PM had overruled them. More power would be needed to break through the Shields, but all of the modern anti-armor weapons (the AT4 and such) were disposable—strictly one-use-only. That was no good for a situation like this. Fortunately, most of the old Carl Gustaf bazookas were still sitting in storage. They and their ammunition had been thrown into trucks, which had picked up police escorts and were speeding toward the Ministry of Magic. Every soldier had smoke grenades (L84 and L132A1) and "conventional" high explosive grenades (nonstandard, a special and expensive model reserved for SAS). The vision systems were limited to the EMP-resistant stuff, but every man had an EMP-resistant radio. The people with Bowman were currently developing such radios for the rest of the British Army, but they wouldn't be ready for years, so these radios were specially made and therefore expensive. Being SAS, they wore special body armor and helmets, the very existence of which was a secret.

The personnel carriers reached Whitehall. They screeched to a halt in front of the cordon of policemen, which quickly let them pass. The SAS exited the trucks with incredible speed and took their formations—only to learn that the Carl Gustafs would not be there for another half hour and they would have to wait. Word of this was relayed to COBR, which was not happy, but there was nothing to be done about it. Per instructions from what Kingsley continued to think of as the shiny general, one of the troops from G Squadron (chosen because they were the most recently trained as the Special Projects Team from those there) took up positions in the toilet leading to the Ministry. Anyone who came out would be tackled and detained, to prevent them from going back down and warning everyone— _not_ shot, unless there was no other choice. If nothing else, the noise from that might be audible down there.

Two squadrons of SAS is a fair number of men. Telling you, the reader, about each and every one of them would be impossible. So I'll tell you about Lance Corporal Wood, D Squadron, Air Troop, who was 25 years old, from Manchester, had no girlfriend at the moment (not being able to tell her anything about your work tended to cause problems, and he wasn't the shag-and-skip type), and firmly believed that the United Kingdom was the finest country in the world and failing to do everything he possibly could for it would be unthinkable. Lance Corporal Wood was uneasy. He was trained to fight terrorists, enemy soldiers: men with guns, who would die if you shot them. If things went badly, the mission might fail, and that could be very bad for Britain. If he made a mistake, he could cause that to happen. Concern that he, Lance Corporal Wood, might die doing this, never occurred to him. But he quickly suppressed his doubts, _who dares wins_ , and mentally reviewed the plan for the umpteenth time. Each of them had specific assignments as they secured the Atrium. With the Atrium secured, other British Army units would guard the fireplaces (where hostiles could apparently appear, a prospect which made him uneasy again) while the SAS advanced down the lift shafts and cleared the building. They had all been given disposable restraints and instructions about searching people for wands or magical artifacts. (Kingsley had been concerned about a massacre if he mentioned the possibility of wandless magic, which most adults forgot how to do anyway, so he did not disclose this particular information.)

Time passed. No one came out of the Ministry of Magic. Then, at 2:38 AM, Lance Corporal Wood heard loud engines coming closer. He looked up, scanning the situation rapidly, and saw large Army trucks with tarps draped over the backs come around the corner from the direction of Trafalgar Square. His main reaction was relief—he wanted to get this thing over with, one way or the other. He wished briefly he could speak with his mum, but concluded that they'd done all that already, when he made SAS.

The trucks pulled up to the police cordon, were checked, and moved towards them. Orders were shouted and Wood followed them, hurrying into line to receive his anti-tank rifle and a designated number of rounds (one could only carry so many, and there weren't a great number left). This was it.


	5. Chapter 5

The problem of how to enter the Ministry given the new security measures had been a puzzler. Then Kingsley had recalled someone having mentioned Harry and his friends breaking into the Ministry. Shacklebolt had immediately sent a Patronus to Harry, asking about that. Harry quickly answered that they had left the Ministry tokens at Shell Cottage, after Hermione had reasoned that they had no further immediate use for them, but the Order might be able to exploit them. Kingsley had Apparated to Shell Cottage, spent about a minute penetrating Bill and Fleur's protective enchantments, Summoned the tokens, and quickly headed back for London.

At 2:41 AM, Kingsley Shacklebolt appeared with the usual loud crack in the street outside the Ministry entrance. The men there had been warned by radio to expect him, but looks of astonishment and even fear prevailed among the soldiers grouped there (he had been given coordinates where the coppers could not see him). Lance Corporal Wood rubbed his eyes, having trouble making sense of this, then gave up and straightened to perfect attention, waiting and watching silently as Kingsley conferred with the officer in charge. He watched, mostly mentally reviewing the battle plan, as the four tokens were presented to four soldiers of the D Squadron Mountain Troop.

Wood would be in the second wave. The first four would all hand their tokens to the last one through, who would immediately return and distribute the tokens to four more SAS men, so they could come through, and so on. Accordingly, he followed right behind Major Foxcastle and the first wave as they entered the public toilet. The men guarding the place snapped to attention and saluted the major as he came in; he returned this quickly and added "Let's hurry this up," sharply. Wood watched as the man ahead of him closed the stall door behind him, then heard clunking and scraping as he climbed into the toilet. The lever was pulled, the water whirled, and the man was gone. Silence fell, broken only by the heavy breathing of the twenty-odd men in the public toilet.

The Atrium in the Ministry of Magic was mostly empty at this time of night. Most of the non-Death-Eater workers had gone home before the battle at Hogwarts had started, and Voldemort hadn't seen the need to call in most of them. For one thing, his naturally suspicious mind didn't trust most of them; they were only kept around because he needed them to be able to run the country.

Since the trio's break-in, Ministry security had been tightened. Wand inspections were now required for entry or exit, and at least four guards were stationed in the Atrium at all times. At the moment, these guards were four DMLE officers. One, James Smith, was there replacing Jugson, who was supposed to be in charge of security this time of night.

Smith was bored and his legs hurt. Before Scrimgeour's…resignation, he might have passed the time thinking about something: his work, office politics, his last or his next visitation weekend with his son. These days, he'd had to train himself _not_ to think. Whenever he thought, he ended up thinking about the rumors: that Scrimgeour had been murdered, that Voldemort was controlling Britain now, that Mysteries' research on "magical theft" had never existed…damn it, he was doing it now! He mentally repeated his justification to himself: regardless who was in power, the law had to be kept. Theft, robbery, and smuggling did not become acceptable just because the government was…suboptimal.

Smith sighed, and repositioned his legs. He didn't know why they had to stay standing all this time. All it did was make his legs sore. He was still thinking about his sore legs when men covered in black material suddenly burst from the fireplaces. His breath caught, and he lurched up from the wall.

Per plan, two of the SAS had smoke grenades with pins pulled. As they exited the fireplaces, they hurled the grenades, which burst an instant later. Thick white smoke filled the center of the Atrium. Smith raised his wand, along with the others, but they could see nothing through the smoke. The guards hesitated, scanning desperately for the enemy.

"Drop your wands and put your hands in the air!" a voice boomed, and a man emerged from the dissipating smoke, face and body hidden by a strange black suit, holding a thing that looked like a massive metal wand and pointing it at them.

One guard, who had a loving wife and two young children who he wanted to be alive to raise, immediately complied. The others all shouted: " _Stupefy!"_

Red beams flashed across the Atrium, but the SAS trooper had already rolled sideways, and the Stunners all missed. He came up, and the "wand" emitted a series of loud bangs. " _Protego!_ " all three guards shouted – no, Smith realized, two guards. As he turned, he saw one of his fellow guards crumple, bloody holes ripped through his chest. Banging filled the Atrium, Smith saw grey streaks rebound from his shield everywhere, the _strain_ , he dove behind the Muggles in the new statue and heard – curses? – bouncing away everywhere. The other guard, he registered dimly, seemed to have hidden behind the security desk; these things blasted into the desk, wood and splinters flying everywhere.

Lance Corporal Wood swung into motion as the stall door burst open. A token was slapped into his hand, and he mashed it into the slot on the stall as the stall door was slammed again (couldn't risk it needing to be closed again to work), door open, in the toilet, flush it, weapon ready as he flies through the blackness…

He emerged, and slid out to the edge of the entrance, weapon raised. He quickly assessed the situation. One wizard was lying flat on the ground by the wall to avoid the crossfire, not resisting; another seemed to be behind the big statue, judging by the suppressing fire; and a third was leaping up –

 _Something_ whizzed from the wizard's wand and blasted apart an entrance, sending rubble flying everywhere. A large chunk struck another lance corporal in the back and knocked him over, but the body armor held up. Wood realized swiftly that the rifle fire was ineffective, dropped his assault rifle, and pulled the Gustaf AT up. One or two other SAS men were doing the same – the lift, it was coming! But gripping it firmly and bracing his feet, he pulled the trigger. A giant boom and a ring of smoke burst from the bazooka.

The round hit the third wizard square on. A tremendous boom shook the entire Atrium, all the glass shattered, the upper part of the huge black statue spiderwebbed with cracks…and the wizard simply vanished in a ball of churning flame. Every pair of ears in the room was ringing from that explosion in a confined space.

Smith did not even think. He immediately flung away his wand, threw both hands into the air, and screamed " _Don't shoot!_ " He was dimly aware of the lift opening behind him, but otherwise completely focused on those gray tubes pointed _at him_.

The lift held five Death Eaters who had heard the noise on the upper levels and hurriedly come to investigate. Some of them were without masks, which made it all the easier for them to have seen the explosion as the lift reached the Atrium level but before the grille opened. All of them immediately dropped their wands and flung up their hands.

"CEASE FIRE!" a sergeant boomed, but unnecessarily: Britain's finest military discipline had done his job for him. Wood finished reloading the Gustaf and straightened, then set it down (without even thinking about it, pointing away from everyone). He stood there awaiting orders and catching his breath, feeling relieved. That had gone much better than he'd expected. So much for magic.

Ten minutes later, there were some forty armed SAS men in the Atrium. The seven prisoners had been restrained and put in a group by the back wall, and corpsmen were jogging over to the bodies to load them onto stretchers and remove them. The lift had been called back down as the Death Eaters were taken out of it before this could be stopped, so a squad had weapons trained on the shaft, but there had been no effort made to come up, or any sign of activity on the lower levels. Major Foxcastle had gone down to the Atrium for roughly two minutes to have a look at things, then returned to the surface, where Kingsley was waiting, with his usual patient calm, for news.

"Mr. Shacklebolt, we have killed two of the enemy and captured seven," he said as he approached him. "The prisoners are still down there, primarily because we were uncertain what to do with them. I will contact our superiors and obtain instructions."

Kingsley, despite his earlier point to the PM, was startled by "our superiors". It was true, of course, but Ministers of Magic and wizards in general did not really think of it that way. Which was disturbingly similar to Voldemort's ideas about wizard superiority…

His philosophical musings were interrupted by the crackle of the radio. With a crispness and efficiency that impressed even Kingsley, the major summed up the events of the last fifteen minutes.

"Well…this is an interesting situation," Blair stated over the radio. "We have no…information about anyone on the lower levels, and no…tactically sound way to get down there. What do you think, Mr. Shacklebolt?"

"Minister, I think that most of the people down there are merely comparatively innocent Ministry—of Magic—workers doing their jobs. I should be able to project my voice to most of the lower levels and tell them to surrender. I think they will do it."

"Major?"

"It sounds good to me, sirs."

"Very well. I have…prepared the order which…we previously discussed, Mr. Shacklebolt. I suggest, that you read it, so their giving up will be…proper, for everyone involved. Can you…er, take this down?"

Kingsley dug an old arrest warrant and a Muggle pen (one of Arthur Weasley's very useful gifts) from his Auror's robes, then performed the Dictation Charm. Major Foxcastle stared at the pen as it traced out words on the back of the warrant, while Kingsley prepared a Patronus message to the castle's defenders. Both men finished speaking, and Kingsley lifted the paper, muttering some of the text.

" _I do order that Minister Pius Thicknesse is relieved of his move your arses and will immediately relinquish that statue was us, that's what those buggers think of obey commands of the Armed Forces of the do the loos work as actual loos_ …"

Kingsley calmly set down the paper and turned to Major Foxcastle. "Major, I think I will need that again," he said. "The spell seems to have picked up bits of speech not from the radio."

Back in Hogwarts, Hermione was having an interesting time. "No, the planes aren't animals, they're _machines_ , like the Hogwarts Exp—"

"But how does a _machine_ , _fly_?" Hannah Abbot demanded.

"Is it like how a balloon flies?" Rionach O'Neal speculated.

"How fast can it fly?" Romilda Vane asked.

"I am not an expert on Muggle aircraft!" Hermione shouted. "It would take a Muggle with a couple years of university to answer you! All I know is that it's the way in which a bird flies; it's not how a balloon floats. Now if you'll excuse me…"

"Do the wings flap?" Romilda responded immediately, stepping into Hermione's path as she tried to move away from her.

"Oh, why don't you go try to poison Harry again instead of bothering me!?" Hermione snapped. Romilda made a rude gesture at her and stomped off. "Could you all give me a few minutes?" Hermione asked the others more calmly, already regretting losing her cool. Most of them nodded, and Hermione hurried away from them, blushing slightly, looking for Harry and Ron.

No one in the Room of Requirement had gone back to sleep after the air raid. Arthur Weasley and most of the Muggle-borns in the Room, including Hermione, had been being bombarded with questions about machine guns, airplanes, the Muggle government, the RAF, and Merlin knew what else for the last twenty minutes. Hermione could hear Arthur's voice over the general din as she hurried past the group around him.

"No, as I said, the _controls_ run on ekeltricity, but the airplane itself is powered by jet fuel. It's like gasoline for cars, but it shoots out in jets instead of doing infernal combustion."

Harry and Ron were sitting by the Hog's Head passage, talking quietly about what had happened. "Oh, hullo Hermione," Ron said, looking up. "I was just saying to Harry, just one Horcrux left."

"Which is a snake and therefore could be anywhere," Harry answered, as she guessed he already had. "Really, Voldemort was daft to hide them the way he did. It would've made much more sense to chuck one in the Pacific Ocean, or put a levitation spell on one and make it invisible, or, I don't know, stick it to one of those rockets the Americans launch. It would've taken us years and years to find them. I remember mentioning this to Dumbledore, actually."

"So you believe he may have done something like that with Nagini?" Hermione asked.

"No," Harry said. "He's clever, but there are always these big…holes in his thinking. Unfortunately snakes don't show up on the Marauder's Map, we already tried that." He yawned. "God, I'm tired."

"Well, robbing banks, riding dragons, and fighting Voldemort tends to take it out of you," Ron noted.

Before Hermione could suggest that they try to quiet people down and get some rest, Kingsley's Patronus soared into the room.

" _The Muggle soldiers have secured the Atrium in the Ministry_ ," Kingsley's voice declared. " _I will attempt to persuade the remaining wizards there to surrender. In any event, Voldemort will not be receiving any reinforcements from here. Unfortunately, the teachers and I sealed all of the fireplaces in Hogwarts from that end in order to defend the castle, and there is no reason for Voldemort to reopen them."_

Celebratory shouting and cheering filled the room. One of the Weasley twins let out a loud whoop and detonated a squib which turned into a miniature dragon racing around the room. Tonks, pale and weak but back on her feet, embraced Lupin and kissed him. A broad grin filled Harry's face.

"Brilliant," Hermione said, as the excited shouting continued. "Now no one will get any sleep."

" _Sonorus_ ," Auror Shacklebolt invoked as he planted his feet in front of the lift shaft.

"Attention, all persons within the Ministry of Magic offices," he began. "I have here an order from the Prime Minister's office, written and signed by him personally. I remind all of you that as Prime Minister, he has authority over all other Ministries, including the Ministry of Magic. The order is as follows. _I, Anthony Charles Lynton Blair, acting as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, do hereby order that Mister Pius Thicknesse, Minister of Magic, is immediately and entirely relieved of his office, duties, and privileges as Minister of Magic. A successor will be appointed or elected at some later date; until such time as that occurs, authority over the Ministry of Magic and the magical population of Britain will be exercised by Professor Minerva McGonagall. All persons in the Ministry of Magic, or currently engaged in armed resistance to this order elsewhere, should immediately and unconditionally surrender to and fully cooperate with the Armed Forces of the United Kingdom until the present crisis is resolved. So ordered on 2 May 1998, 1:45 AM GMT_."

He paused, trying to balance the effect right. Kingsley had never been one for effect or showmanship, but now was the time if it ever had been.

"To put that simply," he added, "here's what we'll do. Come up in the lift in groups of six at a time. Either leave your wands downstairs, or set them down on the floor of the lift. Put your hands in the air as the lift reaches the Atrium. If you do this at once, you will not be hurt, and may avoid criminal charges. You may respond by Ministry memo; address it to Auror Kingsley Shacklebolt."

Silence fell. Kingsley stepped back to Major Foxcastle and the other officers, and they quietly waited. Nothing could be heard except the heavy breathing of the SAS soldiers. Suddenly a memo came fluttering up the lift shaft. The soldiers, showing their excellent discipline, trained weapons on it but did not fire; the memo fluttered over to Kingsley and fell to the ground at his feet. He picked it up.

"It's from Magical Maintenance," he told the major after a moment. "They say, in no uncertain terms, that they have no interest in fighting us and will come to surrender as soon as we reply." He amplified his voice again. "Those who just sent us a message may come up."

A moment later, the jangle of the lift could be heard.

"Tell your men not to be too rough with this lot," Kingsley muttered to Foxcastle. "They're what you would call janitors, not much of a threat."

"Given the capabilities wizards have demonstrated we will treat them all as potentially serious threats," Foxcastle replied in no uncertain terms, leaving Kingsley even more uneasy about whether this had been a good idea. He concluded there was nothing to be done about it as orange Magical Maintenance uniforms became visible in the rising lift. The lift opened, providing a clear view of four wizards and two witches with their hands as high as they could possibly get them and no sign of wands. Orders were shouted, and as some of the men kept their weapons aimed, others hurried to the lift. With a speed and poise that impressed even Kingsley—he realized then how often he had been impressed that night, and wondered if they could arrange for a few Aurors to undergo SAS training—the wizards and witches were searched and zip-tied. Major Foxcastle ordered that they be put with the rest of the prisoners, and they were marched over there firmly.

"Do we have any intelligence about who else is in this building right now?" a captain asked.

"I could attempt _Hominem revilio_ ," Kingsley answered, "but that probably would not work for the lower levels, and certainly not for Mysteries. If any of the Unspeakables, or anyone for that matter, are holed up in Mysteries, we might have a problem."

"What could they do?" the major asked sharply.

"I don't know," Kingsley answered. "I honestly do not know. If we could find Thicknesse and lift the Imperius Curse, we might have some idea. Most likely, they will be unable to do anything, but trying to find anyone in there would be very difficult and dangerous. And I am not certain we can take the risk of trying to wait them out."

Major Foxcastle decided to return to the surface and ask COBR for instructions. Another lift's load of Magical Maintenance people came jangling up. This was closely followed by a memo from an Obliviator (who had apparently been working on the paperwork involved in Muggles seeing a large dragon with chains dangling from it flying over London) who had fallen asleep at his desk several hours ago and had had no idea that anything else unusual was happening until he had been rudely awakened by the Gustaf explosion. Kingsley, who happened to know this person, was able to tell him via Patronus to come up. 

James Smith shifted again. He was now seated against the wall, so his legs didn't hurt anymore, but his arms, which were still secured behind his back, did. One of the black-robed men—right, admit it, no need to lie anymore, _Death Eaters_ —had complained about this, but got no response from the guards.

No longer terrified of imminent death, he let himself think about the situation for the first time. His lawman's instincts were at once enraged at what this meant: this was clearly a massive breach of the Statute of Secrecy, and might even be uncontainable. But the moral part of him, what had driven him to become a lawman in the first place, fought back, saying that the Order had done what had to be done.


	6. Chapter 6

Things were considerably less cheerful and calm in the Floo Network Authority's offices.

Janice Bell looked around the room again for some way out, but nothing seemed possible. She swore internally, going back over the night's events.

The rest of the FNA workers and her had been called in abruptly around ten. No one had liked this, but you did what they said, these days; people who _didn't_ do what they said tended to disappear. The new head of the division, a Mr. Bullworth, had demanded that Hogwarts and Hogsmeade be completely sealed off from the rest of the fires, at once. He didn't say why. When someone asked, he glared at her violently and said nothing. No one else asked. They did what they were told, but were not allowed to leave when that was finished a few minutes later; they were all told to stay there and await new orders. Williams had made tea for everyone, and they all sat about drinking it and complaining (obliquely and in whispers) about all this bother. Hours had passed. Mr. Bullworth went in and out now and then, but never had any new orders for them when he came back from wherever he had gone. Gradually, most of the staff fell asleep on their desks or on the floor.

Janice hadn't. Most of the rest of them, as it worked out, didn't have any children at Hogwarts. She did, and was worried about Katie. Of course, this could be anything, she'd thought, but she'd had a (now thoroughly justified) bad feeling about it all. She'd been starting to doze off anyway around two, with Bully out of the room again, when she'd started to hear odd noises from the direction of the Atrium. Shortly followed by a massive boom that shook the entire office, sent things crashing off desks, and scared the hell out of everyone.

A few minutes later, Bully had run into the room with two _robed and masked_ _Death Eaters_ , wands trained on the workers! They'd taken all their wands and lined them up against the wall. Janice's initial confusion had given way to hot rage. That festered pus boil, that hippogriff crap, had told them the new security measures were to _fight_ the Death Eaters! Then Kingsley had given his little speech, but Bully had told them they weren't going anywhere and were hostages.

She kept looking, seeing nothing, until—what was that?

A piece of paper a few feet away was flapping weakly. As she watched it, she saw the text of a Ministry memo sent to Mary. She thanked Merlin Mary was a slob, then realized there was no way to get to the thing or rewrite it. Unless…

It would never have occurred to most witches to try what she did next. Hogwarts taught its students in their first year that wandless magic was hard, clunky, slow, and occasionally dangerously unpredictable. Most of them didn't question that: the Ravenclaws mostly were still soaking up knowledge instead of really analyzing it at that age, the few Slytherins interested in trying to exploit it quickly became frustrated with the learning curve or ridiculed for acting like house-elves, and all the others were having enough trouble with the magic they were supposed to learn to be trying other things. Few, if any, ever "turned the corner", sticking with trying it long enough to make it really work. Of course, goblins and house-elves, who had no choice, did make it work. But even for them, it was clunky, crude, (usually) harmless, and rarely able to beat wands.

Janice Bell, however, had not always worked in the FNA. She had started in Experimental Charms, at a desk next to a poster bearing these words: "If it's stupid but it works, it isn't stupid." Then Voldemort had started his first reign of terror, her group was shut down for lack of funds, she was transferred to Floo for some stupid reason, and they were never put back together after Godric's Hollow for some equally stupid reason. (She'd gotten good at reciting this to those who asked, without thinking about it enough to get angry.)

She focused on that memo. Fixing the words…no time for elegant, ink, _move_ , this damn black rubbish has to _move_ , just pool _together_ —and suddenly it all flowed across the paper like a stain spreading, first forward, then in reverse. She took a deep breath, suddenly acutely aware of everything. Williams, at the other end of the line, shifted position against the wall, two masks across the room, _damn_ she wished she knew where they were looking, no help for it, letters, _letters_ , make letters…

It took only a few minutes, but it felt like hours. The strain was bad, but she had to keep going—

A few minutes later, a piece of paper came struggling up the lift shaft. "Ministry memo" and "fluttering" would not have been accurate, because it looked like it had been used as a dragon's nesting material, and "fluttering" implies a degree of gracefulness which this thing definitely lacked. The…thing…flopped out of the lift and onto the floor, and began lurching weakly toward Kingsley. He frowned, suspecting a trap, but a few spells revealed no evidence of that.

" _Accio…Paper_ ," he muttered finally. It flew into his hand, flexing and flapping wildly.

It took him and the major, working as quickly as they could, a good minute to make sense of it; it looked like someone had poured thick ink onto the paper, then attempted to form a message by smearing said ink about with an old paintbrush. It was addressed to Kingsley in a similar fashion, although that was a little neater, probably because the spell couldn't have made sense of it otherwise.

"DETH EATRS HLDNG US IN FNA. WILL SURR IF HELP," seemed to be it, although some of the letters were smeared illegibly.

"F. N. A.?" the major asked.

"Floo Network Authority, on level six," Kingsley answered. "This is rather…difficult. The hostages won't have any wands, so if you set off explosions in there, they could be hit by flying debris."

"Do you have a map of the area?" Foxcastle queried, beckoning several other officers over.

"No, and I cannot describe it either. I have never been there. I can attempt to negotiate with them," Kingsley suggested, as the officers looked concerned about that. He didn't add that there were—or had been—two negotiation specialists in the Aurors, but he wasn't one of them. It made no difference: they were not here, and he was.

"Well, we don't have much to lose by attempting it," the major answered after a moment. "My senior officers and I will try to devise an assault plan, but we are likely to take casualties if we attempt this."

Kingsley nodded grimly, then walked back to the lifts and amplified his voice. "Attention, Death Eaters in the Floo Network Authority offices," he said. "If you release your hostages and surrender immediately, you will not be hurt, and we may be willing to reduce your sentences. If any hostages are killed, you will all be charged with willful murder, a crime punishable by life imprisonment in Azkaban." He paused, trying to decide how to phrase his next statement, then settled on a wording. "We are prepared to consider reasonable requests, but cannot promise that we will accede to them. You may convey your response via a Ministry memo to Auror Shacklebolt. I know how to detect booby-trapped memos, so you may as well not try that. Shacklebolt out."

On level six, "Bully", much to Bell's amusement, was having a fit.

"How did he know we were here?" he wailed at one of the Death Eaters. "That piece of dragon dung! I hate him! I hate them. Those half-breeds ruin everything!"

"What d'yeh want us ter do, boss?" one of the Death Eaters asked. "Can we curse 'em?"

"Be silent," the other one told him in much higher-class English. He added something no one else quite caught about thugs and blood purity commitment.

"What am I going to do?" Bullworth demanded. "What am I going to _do_?" His voice became increasingly shrill and whiny. "If the Dark Lord comes back and I gave up, he'll kill us! But if we don't give up, those Muggles'll kill us! It's not fair!"

"Boss?"

Bullworth turned around, ran through his office door, slammed it, and locked it. He could be heard shouting and wailing within. The Death Eaters looked at each other.

"Very well," said the better-educated one. He pulled the other one close to him, and began speaking in a low voice, keeping his wand pointed at the FNA workers. Janice's breath came fast and hard—what were they going to do?

"Right!" the first one declared loudly. "Good plan! That's what we'll tell 'em!" Then he stopped. "But wha' about our Dark Marks?"

"Merlin blast it!" the other one shouted. "Right! New plan! Er…erm…damn."

"I want ter curse someone," the first Death Eater said. "I been in the Death Eaters three months and ain't cursed one person."

"You're an idiotic sociopath," the less idiotic one told him. "Let me—"

"Yer a weenie bugger!"

"You do not even know what blood purity is!"

"If yer so great, how come yer here an' not at Hogwarts?"

"Shut yer trap!" the more idiotic one said, and pointed his wand at the other. The second one swung _his_ wand around, and both yelled incantations at the same time.

Several minutes later, Janice was zip-tied in the Atrium and answering questions. These things were a bit tight, but she was much more interested in the Muggles. These shining metal wands, this sleek black material they wore, the little boxes that crackled and spoke…it was like a different sort of magic.

"Well, that was a stroke of luck," Kingsley said. Given the state the two Death Eaters were in, the obvious retort was _Except for the guy who has to guard the prisoners_ , but neither man had that kind of a sense of humor—or much of a sense of humor at all, when you got down to it. Kingsley examined the trail of purple slime one of them had left across the Atrium floor. Both had been hit by a fair number of nasty but ultimately superficial hexes, and were unconscious. None of the other prisoners admitted to knowing anything about why they'd been hit by so many.

"Bullworth," Janice said with contempt, "seems to have locked his cowardly arse in his office. He's still down there, as far as I know. No one wanted to try to get him out, they've had some nasty anti-intruder curses on the doors since the breach in September."

"Very well, thank you, put her with the rest of the prisoners," Major Foxcastle ordered.

"What? Why?" Janice demanded, as an SAS man seized her shoulder and pushed her toward the far corner. "Merlin, I'm on your side!"

"Major," Kingsley began, "I have heard of this woman, and I see no reason to doubt her—"

"My orders are to detain all wizards and witches in this facility."

Kingsley opened his mouth, then closed it again. As this situation stood, it was doing no significant harm. Escalating it possibly would. He nodded curtly, first to the Muggle commander, then to Bell. Still looking angry, she stopped her token resistance.

"I will send an officer to try to persuade this Bullworth to surrender," Major Foxcastle explained. "If that fails, you should attempt to remove the…curses. Do you expect there to be any additional hostiles in this…facility?"

"Possibly a few," Kingsley told him. "But this is already more than what we usually had at night, aside from emergency responders. And the 'Aurors' are all either real Aurors, who are mostly…" His voice caught for an instant; he knew some of them. "…deserted or…dead. Or, Death Eaters, who are probably at Hogwarts." He firmly got his composure back. "There was one night team in Magical Creatures when I was here last, but that may have changed. I do not expect they would be Death Eaters, so the lack of a message probably means there is no one there."

"Very well." The major turned sharply and began addressing his officers. "Captain Macfie, I want a sweep of the second level. As, ah, Mr. Shacklebolt has detected no one on that level, you may use the lift if it functions. Lieutenant Mackinnon, take your men and secure the Department of Mysteries level outside the Department of Mysteries itself; do not enter that area unless absolutely necessary, which means you had better be buggered six ways to Sunday and have no other choice. Captain Thompson—where is Captain Thompson? Ah, yes—Sergeant! Instruct Captain Thompson to proceed to the Floo Network Authority with an escort and attempt to persuade a man locked in the manager's office there to surrender himself; he should not attempt to enter the office under any circumstances."

A chorus of "Yes, sirs," rang out. Men sprang into action throughout the Atrium: helmets were donned, weapon safeties disengaged, and formations formed. Wood, under Macfie's command, moved quickly into position by the lifts. This time, when a sergeant pressed the call button, the sound of jangling and banging could be heard. Wood, Macfie, and most of the unit winced; that could be heard by anyone still in the building. The lift lurched up into the Atrium at last, and opened.

"Don't enter yet," Macfie ordered as the lift arrived. Wood watched as he ran back across the Atrium and began speaking with Major Foxcastle, gesturing to the lift. The…friendly wizard was soon called over, and they conferred briefly. Macfie nodded, saluted, and hurried back to his men.

"Right, let's go," he called. With a few "yessirs", Wood and the rest of the men stepped into the lift. Wood noticed it swaying, and possibly creaking, under the weight—probably what the captain had been concerned about—but said nothing, taking position in the cab. His vision filled with helmets, assault rifles, and AT rifles, he heard rather than saw the lift doors close.

Kingsley watched as the doors closed behind the squad, then the Mysteries-level group and the negotiator in the other lift. He let out a breath, with time to think at last. Who had given the order to treat all the wizards and witches as hostiles, he wondered. Certainly no one had told him about it; if anyone had, he would have made his views known. But with Voldemort still on the loose, he did not want to try to go over Major Foxcastle's head now. The last thing he wanted was for the SAS to stop listening to him. On the other hand, they couldn't have everyone in Hogwarts detained—for one thing, the Muggles would need all the help they could get against Voldemort. He _would_ have to speak with the PM or the rest of COBRA about that. But he eventually needed to determine…well, what to do. With the PM's authority, they could try to contain this, Obliviating everyone who knew the details of this operation. Without that authority…that could be a problem. They could not do it without Blair's consent; to do so would make them no different from Voldemort, usurping power by magic from the duly elected Government of the United Kingdom. If Blair would not allow the Obliviation—or if tonight's events, for some other reason, could not be covered up—

 _Well._

Kingsley decided to do something more productive (although, he wouldn't admit to himself, a more accurate description was "finding a distraction"). He drew his wand and began preparing a Patronus for Hogwarts.

Talk continued in the Room of Requirement, but people had mostly returned to chairs, bunks, or the floor, dividing into groups of trusted friends to try to understand the situation. Hermione had been listening to some of the conversations, and was becoming worried about a few of the ones she was hearing. The celebration of the Ministry being taken from the Death Eaters seemed to have given way, in some quarters, to uncertainty, consternation, and even fear about Muggles now being in effective control of it. The ever-analytical Ravenclaws were reminding others that the Statute had been created to protect wizards and witches from Muggles, as much as the reverse, and that that was with the capabilities Muggles had had then…

Hermione, herself, couldn't swear they were wrong. Her father was Labour, and her mother Conservative (the dinner-table discussions were one of the many things that had made her what she was). Her mother had always been very confident in the military, talking about how it was the only thing between them and the Soviet Union's oppression; her father had been much more suspicious of it. They had argued about the Falklands War for _years_ after it was all over, and the missile defense systems even more so. Hermione was trying to work this thing out for herself now, but that fundamental confidence in humanity's getting things right in the end on the one hand was struggling with the knowledge of how easy it was to dehumanize a perceived enemy, and she simply couldn't work out what was likely to happen. Could they trust the Muggles now? Or would they go back to the insanity of the past?

There were never easy solutions to political questions: the constant debates in her house had taught her that. But now it was confronting her for the first time: the decisions they made today could alter the fates of millions. And she had no bloody idea what to do.

Harry, having heard all this, was feeling worse. His knowledge of Muggle politics, and behavior, was more or less limited to believing the opposite of whatever the Dursleys had said. His scar was still hurting badly, probably due to Voldemort being just across the room. Swearing under his breath, he finally stood and walked back to Hermione. She was staring into space, lost in thought, and jumped as he approached.

"All right?" she asked gently.

"Scar's hurting. I'll manage," he answered, sitting down next to her. "What d'yeh reckon about all this?"

"I honestly don't know," she said. "What if we can't Obliviate them all? What if we cannot keep ourselves hidden any longer? What then? I…there are just too many unknowns in all this…"

"I reckon we need a plan for if the Muggles, well, you know…"

"There are too many unknown quantities there too," Hermione sighed. "Maybe we should try to get some more rest."

"Suits me," Harry agreed, rubbing his scar. "I'll talk to Lupin, see if we can get everyone quieted down again."

"Hang on in there," she told him. He nodded, then began scanning the room for Lupin, eventually spotting him sitting next to Tonks on a couch which had spontaneously appeared. They were leaning on one another quietly, holding each other up in more ways than one. Harry glanced back to Hermione, and for a moment there was this strange feeling in his head, like he had seen a signpost and followed it to something that was no longer there. He shook it off—probably just some more garbage from Voldemort, who was still out in the corridor, becoming increasingly enraged—and began hurrying across the room. At that moment, 3:21:42 AM GMT, Kingsley's Patronus soared into the Room of Requirement.

" _Attention, defenders of Hogwarts,_ " it said. " _Take a moment to soundproof this room before I continue; Voldemort should not hear what I will say_." The voice paused. This was quickly done, as most of the people inside focused on keeping sound from leaving the Room and the Room heeded them.

" _Very well. COBRA and I have devised a plan. Around sunrise, Special Air Service personnel will assault Hogwarts and Hogsmeade from multiple directions. Persons in British military uniforms are our friends and allies. However, they may insist upon temporarily detaining some of you: if they do, please comply with their instructions._ _I will do my best to prevent this from being necessary_. _You can expect forces to enter from the Hogsmeade passage after securing the pub: those who wish to stay out of the action can then be evacuated. I realize that this information is rather…vague; I will attempt to provide more concrete information when it is available. In the meantime, I strongly recommend that you all remain where you are and not attempt any positive action. Shacklebolt out._ "

" _Temporarily,_ eh?" someone shouted.

"Quiet!" Lupin yelled before chaos could break out. "I promise you, we will resolve this…situation. Arthur, Harry, Hermione, will you all step over here please?"

The hubbub lowered but didn't die as Hermione hurried over, nearly passing Harry. Kingsley may have been a great Auror, but this wasn't good timing…on the other hand, she couldn't really come up with any _better_ timing, so maybe he had just made the best of a bad situation…

"Arthur, you know about Muggles, you work with them," Lupin said, sounding somewhat desperate. "What do you think of all this?"

"I was Muggle Artifacts, not Liaison," Arthur answered nervously.

"Nymphy," Lupin cleared his throat violently, " _Tonks_ , you?"

"I don't like the sound of it," she said. "Death Eaters under Muggle control is one thing, but this…"

Lupin scanned the group, and those around it, as though hoping some idea what to do was to be seen somewhere. Finding nothing, he dropped his eyes.

The lift, coming back up, banged open. Captain Macfie marched out and across the Atrium, followed by his men. He reached the major, halted, and saluted. The major returned it quickly.

"Sir! We have checked the entire second level. We found no one there, although some of the offices seemed to have been searched before we arrived."

"Very good, Captain," Major Foxcastle answered. "Proceed to the next level and search it as well. Proceed down after that, unless anything unusual is encountered, in which case someone should be sent back to report. The facts that Mr. Shacklebolt detected no one there, and no one was there, do not necessarily imply that Mr. Shacklebolt is always right."

"Yes sir."


	7. Chapter 7

Below Kingsley Shacklebolt, squads of SAS swept through the Ministry of Magic swiftly and silently. Above him, the Metropolitan Police maintained a perimeter around the Ministry entrance, with a second cordon of soldiers within that. Helicopters full of more SAS were approaching Hogwarts, where the castle was full of Death Eaters. Kingsley felt alone, cut off, as he'd never been before. In the old days of trying to run down Dark wizards and witches, sometimes alone, there had been safe places to return to, home bases, help to call on, his office in the Ministry and his spartan flat. Now, there was nothing: he had no powerful friends, only enemies and uncertain allies. There was no precedent or protocol for this: just by participating in this scheme, he was violating the Statute of Secrecy, and Muggles and wizards had not directly struggled in centuries. He slowly let out a breath, holding the façade of imperturbable toughness.

Around Remus Lupin, wizards and witches waited for him to act. Just beyond the confines of the Room of Requirement, a small army waited, ready to spring for their throats the instant the Room failed to shelter them. He wished Professor McGonagall or Flitwick had made it in, but both were with groups of students hidden elsewhere in the castle, having chosen to protect every student they could rather than run for the Room. Fortunately the Death Eaters seemed to have given up on searching for these stragglers. Trelawney seemed to have been killed in the fighting. He had Nymphy (as she, grudgingly, allowed only him to call her), but these kinds of nuanced situations weren't really what she was good at.

With non-evil adults in command for the first time in far too long, most of the students, even the D.A., looked to them for leadership, not Harry or Neville. Both were perfectly fine with this, and had told anyone who asked, to do as Lupin said. Voldemort's anger and proximity had Harry in decidedly suboptimal condition, and Neville, for all his courage, had never liked commanding the D.A., and was glad to have someone who knew what he was doing making the decisions. That Lupin, Tonks, and Arthur Weasley _didn't_ know what they were doing never crossed his mind.

Remus looked up, seeing gazes fixed upon him. He sighed. He had to do the sensible thing, the _safe_ thing. For a werewolf with a conscience, risks had to be out of the question: it had only been James' and Sirius' persuasiveness that got him to go along with the Animagus scheme. And in the end, although of course he wouldn't think of it this way, he'd survived and they hadn't. But this time, there was no safe thing. Unknown or unpredictable dangers lay on every course he could take now.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake!" Tonks exclaimed finally. "I'll message Kingsley and tell him to get the prime minister to put a stop to this."

Remus opened his mouth to raise objections to this, but realizing he didn't have any better ideas, closed it and nodded. Tonks raised her wand, speaking so all could here.

"Kingsley, this possible _detention_ of us is offensive and unacceptable to a load of the people here. I understand the Muggles' worries, this is just going to be trouble. Remus and I will vouch for the trustworthiness of anyone in this room." Remus rapidly remembered that other time someone close to him had been sure of someone else's trustworthiness, but stayed silent—there was still no better plan. "If the Muggles don't like that, I don't think we can accept their help." The Patronus was sent.

With COBRA in the eye of the storm, with nothing to be done for the time being, thought on what they had seen and done was possible. The generals and admirals were already internally laying out plans for how to fight wizards in the future when/if (depending on the person in question's thought process) necessary (entirely futilely, as they still didn't know most of what they could do). Davies, the Science Adviser, was rapidly scribbling on a piece of paper things like "Apparent 1st Law thermo violation?", "Controlled wormholes—requiring what?", and "Casimir effect exploitation?" trying to get his head around the implications of what he had seen. They had been such simple acts, evidently, the levitation and teleportation, but they had thrown everything he knew into chaos and he still had far more questions than potential answers. He sighed and reached for another sheet of paper.

The prime minister himself stared at a blank situation display, thinking; like the Science Adviser, he was coming up with far more problems than solutions. The big one, which he'd been able to put off until now, was what to do with the soldiers and pilots who had seen magic, giants, and enormous spiders. He had figured out Mr. Shacklebolt and Ms. McGonagall would want to erase their memories of these events—there must be incidents when the cover was broken, he reasoned, and that was the only alternative he could see to killing or imprisoning all the witnesses, which didn't strike him as something these people would do and in any case would create additional complications associated with the missing people. In this case, though...there would be serious consistency problems. All the documentation associated with the military operations would have to be destroyed. Some explanation or concealment would be needed for the missing ammunition and jet fuel. The London coppers securing the perimeter of the Ministry of Magic entrance would need some story of what they had been doing all those hours.

And if it couldn't be done—what then? The whole world could change. And (on the edge of his consciousness) the new world might not need the Right Honourable Tony Blair as Prime Minister.

Kingsley had received Tonks' Patronus by this time. He sighed. This was a confrontation that would have to happen sooner or later. Tired magically from all of the Apparition, he decided to take the surface streets at least part of the way there. He needed time to think. He explained what he was doing to the SAS commander, who nodded. As Kingsley headed for the tube to the surface, the lift came rattling up into the Atrium with a squad of SAS and a zip-tied Magical Maintenance guy who seemed to have spilled butterbeer all over his front.

4 AM came. Kingsley strode past the Metropolitan Police cordon, his flapping cloak drawing a few odd looks. He knew COBRA could be reached from 10 Downing, so that was where he was heading. His long legs ate up distance quickly.

He tried to strategize, to lay out a plan, like he would when preparing for a mission. But he realized he had no idea what he was doing. Hopefully they wouldn't try to make him the Minister if they won. It would be one hell of a learning curve. He considered the original problem carefully, but could only conclude that he should calmly explain the reasons treating everyone like potential enemies was a bad idea.

Shortly before Kingsley's footsteps echoed in the dimly lit streets of London, heard only by those up very late or very early, the SAS helicopters approached Hogwarts. Although the building itself was Unplottable, the railroad tracks the Hogwarts Express traversed were not; you couldn't make something Unplottable that was connected like that unless you wanted half the trains in Britain to get lost. The tracks were enchanted to look abandoned, with many pieces of rails and ties appearing to be rusted, rotten, or missing. Nonetheless, the dim moonlight was adequate to follow the clear strip between the trees. Captain Macduff finished checking his equipment for at least the tenth time, and sighed, staring out of the helicopter at the darkness.

It was a mad world, he thought. If only people would just see sense and elect solid, sensible Tories and listen to the Queen, it might be a less mad one. (He didn't like the Scottish nationalists, who couldn't seem to see the obvious fact that a divided Britain would be weaker than a united one, and vulnerable to all manner of foreign threat; at least the English were the devil you knew. This, and his Conservative politics, were not popular back home, which was one reason he'd originally joined the military.) But none of that had happened, and so he'd got his chance to serve Her Majesty in the Falklands. It had been a bloody unpleasant business. The Argentinians had never really had a chance, the poor buggers, but he'd had a job to do and they'd stood in the way.

Back in the old days, he thought, when the Sun never set on the Empire, there hadn't been all this trouble with wizards. Then again, maybe there had, and he didn't ken about it.

The helicopters were approaching the coordinates they'd been given. Helicopters were noisy, so to avoid alerting the Death Eaters, they were going to land several miles from Hogsmeade and proceed on foot. If there had been more time to prepare, they might have had jeeps or trucks, but given the fitness standard for SAS, there shouldn't be a problem getting into position in time. The rotors' thudding slowed as the helicopters descended in a line following the narrow clear zone around the tracks. The rotors sent air whooshing and shushing through the surrounding pines; a few animals called out or scurried away.

The men scrambled out of the helicopters as others landed further up the tracks, lights glowing and rotors whooshing, casting flickering light on the trees. Captain Macduff hurried that way as soon as they were safely on the ground. The officers in command of the different troops and squadrons quickly and quietly sorted out which men were supposed to be with which unit. Macduff's men gathered around him.

"Right, we will remain here until 0510, at which point our helicopter will take off and proceed over our landing zone. I want double and triple checks of your chutes and equipment, all of you." They knew that, but he'd remind them anyway. "Everyone is to be back on the helicopter by 0500. I'll see if we have any rations."

A chorus of affirmative responses. Macduff returned to the second helicopter, which did have some 12-hour ORPs. He took enough for his troop, and made sure every man had some food before opening his own.

Kingsley reached 10 Downing Street. The next ten minutes were spent dealing with confused security people, then walking more.

"Ah...Mr. Shacklebolt, it's good to see you," the prime minister said when Kingsley entered. "Do you not...ah, teleport...all of the time?"

"It gets exhausting, doing it too much in a short time," he answered shortly.

"You look all right, as near as I can see, that is."

"Not exhausting the way running is exhausting. Not being knackered exactly. Muggles can't really understand. Look, I need to speak with you."

Blair smiled slightly and nodded.

"The soldiers are under orders to take all of the wizards and witches into custody. Including the ones who are on our side."

"I..." The prime minister seemed genuinely surprised. "I was not aware of that. General?"

"That's correct, Minister. I consider all of these... _sorcerers_ to be potential threats."

"Mr. Shacklebolt," Blair said, after a moment, in a conciliatory sort of way, "you have to understand the...position here. Our soldiers have no...experience with magic. You must expect..."

"Minister, if you insist upon this, you will be creating far more danger than you avoid. The Statute was put in place because of your...that is, of some Muggles' [the general looked up at that, suspicious of the way he said it, maybe not the best word, but he'd tried] insistence on insane hatred of and violence against us. Many of us, even those on our side, do not trust—those without magical abilities. There were wizards and witches hanged in England and in Scotland." Most of the people executed hadn't been real wizards or witches, and most of the ones who had, had been able to survive with magic, but the PM didn't need to know that. Of course, the English approach to witchcraft had been to prosecute people for the crimes that had supposedly been committed with magic, which _had_ on occasion been real and serious crimes committed with real magic, but the PM definitely didn't need to know _that_. Kingsley realized he had paused, and cleared his throat. "It was worse in other places. If you insist upon seizing and binding all of the wizards and witches in Hogwarts, you may find yourself fighting more than the Death Eaters."

"Minister, anyone disposed to resist us can be dealt with. We cannot allow these _sorcerers_ to defy the authority of—"

"To defy what?" A man in a well-decorated police uniform broke in. "The people who are under attack from this 'Riddle' have committed no offences. On what grounds are they to be arrested? For how long are they to be detained?"

"This is a military operation."

"These are subjects of Her Majesty the Queen." They weren't shouting, but the force behind each statement was palpable.

"Never mind the legal questions," Shacklebolt said, as Blair wavered. "Right now, these people are our allies. Their support could save many lives of our soldiers."

"Minister, are we to let this man determine government policy?" someone demanded.

"Mr. Shacklebolt released me from Riddle's mind control. His place is here." Blair answered, unusually decisively.

"Did he? How do you know whether that is what he did? Perhaps he just replaced it with his own."

"Not everyone thinks like you, General," Kingsley said quietly. The general's face coloured.

A long pause.

"Very well, Mr. Shacklebolt," the prime minister said finally. "General, we will not be detaining any wizards within Hogwarts, except those who...support these 'Death Eaters'. Please issue the orders."

"Minister—"

"Issue the orders," he repeated calmly.

"Yes, Minister." The general went to one of the telephones, lifted it, and began to speak. Kingsley, worried about what he was doing, glanced at the PM, who nodded to reassure him—General Wheeler was a well-decorated officer, and would follow orders. Everyone else was silent, mostly looking at the maps which had been sketched on the table, but without the expectation of learning anything new. The prime minister offered Kingsley a seat, which he accepted, breathing, well, not quite easily, but closer to it, for the first time in a few hours. Maybe he wasn't a politician yet, he thought. But he could learn. He prepared to send a Patronus to Hogwarts with the good news.

While the Air Troops ate, rested, and waited, the other Troops moved out towards the castle, or Hogsmeade. It was only a handful of miles, nothing compared to the time and distance requirements of the selection process. The load was the same as usual, unfortunately: the Carl Gustaf AT rifles had all been stored down near London and there had been no way to move them north quickly, not to mention that most of the remaining ammunition was needed by the troops there.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione had gravitated back together near the Hog's Head tunnel entrance, not speaking, as there was little more to be said. Others' agitated voices blended together indistinctly, making Harry's head hurt. He felt terrible; his scar and Voldemort's mood swings had been driving him mad all night, and he'd had only a few hours of sleep. He wished that he was back in class here, or even at the Dursleys', and for this to just be a bad dream. Ron's stomach growled.

"Could we hide from the Muggles, if we had to? If they knew what to look for?" Hermione asked.

"I dunno," Harry said, as he or Ron had done half a dozen times already. Hermione sighed and was silent again. Harry stared blankly at the wall. A minute passed.

A glowing lynx soared into the room.

" _Attention, defenders of Hogwarts. Please confirm that the Room is soundproof._ " A pause, as all eyes turned to Kingsley's Patronus. " _Regarding my earlier message, I am pleased to inform you that the SAS personnel will_ not _be detaining you. You will be cooperating with them as allies. Again, remain where you are and take no action. Help is coming._ "

Ron started to clap. Someone else followed, and soon the Room echoed with applause. There was little cheering, though—it was relief, not joy. There was still a fight ahead.

Hermione smiled at Harry. She knew he'd had a hard time of it, and it was easy for him to believe the worst of people—although, come to think of it, he'd been right more often than not. Harry returned a weak smile, understanding her constant frustration with others' malice or incompetence, but unshakeable belief that it didn't have to be that way.

The applause died. "Right," Lupin called out briskly, pulling away from Tonks for the moment. "We need to be prepared to fight. Everyone make sure your wand is ready to hand and in good condition." A flurry of motion ensued as people scrabbled for their wands, or pulled them out and examined them. "If anyone has no wand or a damaged one, speak with me at once. Everyone should have been put into, ah, combat groups earlier. Regroup with your group. Groups which are smaller than four people due to...for any reason, combine with other groups. Stick together, keep your head, and don't try to take on Voldemort by yourself, and you'll get through this."

Something occurred to Harry as Ron rejoined him and Hermione by the Hog's Head passage door. "Hermione, why is it so difficult to stop Voldemort when there's no _Avada_..." He trailed off, painful memories, his and Voldemort's, rising to the surface.

"When there's no _Avada_ countercurse or defence?" she asked. "Well, Crouch might have told us that, but he was simplifying a bit. It's true there's no way to stop it directly, but there are ways to appear to be somewhere slightly different from where you are, ways to manipulate probabilities so your enemies' curses miss, some kind of precognition, in a sense, well, looking at it in terms of linear time, it's precognition..." Hermione rarely sounded this confused. "It's very difficult stuff, is the point," she said hurriedly, "and I understand most wizards or witches need years of dedicated study to be able to do it."

"So that'd be one thing Voldemort was doing after he left Borgin and Burkes," Harry thought aloud.

There was a clatter across the room. Hannah Abbott seemed to be making tea: the Room had generated a burner, kettle, and presumably water, although it couldn't have made any tea leaves or bags. Perhaps someone had had some.

"God, remember Divination?" Ron remarked, looking at that. "What a load of tosh."

"I'd take Divination over this," Harry opined, gesturing at the sealed, besieged room. Hermione nodded, realizing why Harry could handle this better than them. He was used to a hostile world, and malice or disinterest as the default human interaction. It was awful, of course, but she could see a bit of the logic now of why Dumbledore kept Harry at the Dursleys', instead of finding some other approach to keeping him safe. Of course, that was a gamble, not everyone responded the same to that kind of psychological pressure...

Harry checked the time: 4:21 AM. He yawned again, due to sheer exhaustion, not boredom, and hoped he could get some of that tea.


End file.
